Responding to dynamic shifts in value communications

OPEN Health’s Beth Lesher and Annemarie Clegg examine what the convergence of medical communications and market access means for pharmaceutical companies.

Value in healthcare is a continually changing concept. As the needs of different stakeholders evolve and gain in prominence, pharmaceutical companies must be prepared to address value from various viewpoints using a variety of different metrics.

The evolution of value in healthcare is a trend that has important implications for communications, particularly because ‘value’ is very much in the eye of the beholder. For a physician, value may centre around safety and efficacy whereas healthcare decision makers and regulators may place more emphasis on cost. Patients may place more value on cost when dealing with a chronic disease and quality of life when dealing with an end of life illness.

As patients play a more active part in their own care, physicians grapple with the ever-changing nature of medical science and payers are continually pushed by budgetary constraints, it’s important to understand that how you communicate value to the industry’s various audiences needs to be different.

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