Why Can’t We Be Friends? Forging Deeper Pharma-Provider Bonds

At best, provider institutions and pharmaceutical companies are frenemies. At worst, they are adversaries. Either way, the acrimony isn’t working for anyone, especially patients.

There are many reasons for this, not least of which are the necessary but challenging legal and regulatory constraints governing these relationships, as well as the surface tension generated when drug utilization and profitability collide. However, even when operating within these constraints, there is a better way to collaborate, one where both stakeholders bring their full sets of needs and capabilities to the table to develop and pursue a shared set of common goals. But how do we get there?

We believe there is a clear path forward for pharmaceutical companies that want to forge more meaningful relationships with their provider customers and differentiate themselves. It starts with a shift in mindset, away from driving utilization and towards figuring out how to add value to provider institutions. This requires a different set of behaviors focusing on a holistic approach to relationship development rather than eyeing short-term fixes. Key Account Managers (KAMs) are the linchpin to this effort. This article spotlights four strategic areas where KAMs can play a pivotal role in turning the current situation from a lose-lose-lose proposition to one where providers, pharmaceutical companies, and patients all win.

Critically, KAMs need to be strategic in how they approach this effort. We go into more detail below, but some provider institutions aren’t ready to make the transition. Without a set of mutually beneficial outcomes, the process will devolve to a transactional sales model.

The heat is on

All the drivers of a sub-optimal relationship dynamic are here to stay and arguably getting worse: rising drug cost, eroding margin, increased competition and choice, increased administrative complexity for new agents, staffing shortages, and more. We must come together to make the system work for the patient. Critically, there’s no one-size-fits-all approach to provider engagement. Pharmaceutical companies must approach each customer individually and understand their unique challenges and strategic priorities. KAMs have to become deeply familiar with a provider’s internal processes and workflow — how prepared are they for a more transformational partnership? Who are the key stakeholders in management and the C-suite? Essentially, KAMs should work with their provider partners to co-create solutions that meet their clinical, strategic, operational, and financial priorities.

Four areas of focus

While there are a host of areas that need attention, we think drugmakers will get the largest and most immediate return by tackling four specific areas: clinical evidence, clinical care pathways, care coordination and education, and comprehensive engagement. Each is defined by its set of competencies and goals.

• Clinical evidence: Providers want to generate holistic evidence to guide their decision-making. Drugmakers often propose programs or solutions within the silo of their single agent. That is not how patient care works. Drugmakers need to think more creatively and collaboratively to develop patient registries and real-world evidence in the context of holistic patient care. Shifting the starting point from asset-focused to patient-centric is the key to developing a meaningful partnership at a business level.
• Clinical care pathways: Instead of the current model where patient support and drug management programs are built around a specific drug, pharmaceutical companies can partner with providers to integrate patient care pathways across the broad patient journey in a drug-agnostic way. Creating a simpler pathway for patients and reducing red tape in their care generally rather than on a drug-by-drug basis will ultimately benefits patients and deliver value to the providers.
• Care coordination and education: Care coordination and patient movement across sites of care are an area of frustration for every stakeholder. Armed with a plethora of data on prescribing patterns at both the physician and institutional levels, pharmaceutical companies are well positioned to improve the situation. KAMs can work with provider institutions to co-createan improved system of communication and coordination across hospitals, including partnering on educational initiatives to connect key opinion leaders at academic medical centers with providers in community settings and satellite sites. This will help address a top-line issue and ensure patients can seamlessly continue treatment across settings, especially when disease progression leads to referral from a community setting to an academic medical center or other tertiary care facility.
• Comprehensive engagement: To move beyond transactional relationships, drugmakers must work with providers beyond the treatment stage. Collaborating to create comprehensive patient engagement programs across the entire care journey — screening, patient education, clinician training, access, financial support, patient and clinician experience, digital tools, and registry — will allow pharmaceutical companies to be a true partner. In turn, these comprehensive programs can ease patient access to treatment in a timely fashion which ultimately leads to better outcomes, which is the ultimate goal.

It’s worth reinforcing that providers have different priorities, so KAMs need to tailor their approaches accordingly. Armed with sizeable budgets and more administrative staff, large health systems and AMCs may prioritize relationships around evidence generation and integrating clinical care pathways. Conversely, smaller community and rural hospitals may get more value out of financial and administrative support, including care coordination and education, as well as comprehensive engagement programs.

Where and how to start

Forging new relationships with providers won’t happen overnight. It is critical that pharmaceutical companies start now to build a new framework:

• Reorganize and prioritize: Reorganize the KAM / account management team to be focused on collaborative relationships and arm them with the tools to develop a tailored plans to meet needs of individual provider systems and stakeholders
• Have a long-term mindset: Change the company’s mindset from short-term to long-term and focus on what the needs are today versus opportunities to build for the future.
• Rethink incentives: Reconsider KAMs’ goals and incentives to ensure they are properly focused on building collaborative relationships and keeping provider partners’ goals in mind
• Have a menu of offerings: Build a strategic plan including a menu of potential offerings that can be tailored by and with providers
• Think about the portfolio, not the product: Be willing to engage and build partnerships around the full portfolio of therapeutic areas
• Be a data evangelist: Engage at a higher level with providers on data collection and analysis, including gathering real-world evidence that can further patient care and drug development
• Co-create: Work hand-in-hand with providers to collaboratively create the optimal partnership for both parties

Pharmaceutical companies that want to push past the frenemy stage to become partners with provider institutions need to embrace this new mindset. But for the transformation to happen, the true potential of KAMs needs to be unleashed. KAMs must commit to understanding the unique needs of each of their provider partners and a willingness to co-create solutions with the future in mind.