This story has been updated.

Kathleen Bonetti, EVP, marketing, Rx Edge Pharmacy Networks

Point-of-care tactics will never become overwhelming as long as they deliver real value. Real value comes from education, helping patients understand a brand or a condition, and stimulating them to want to learn more. Real value comes from delivering information at a time and place where patients are most likely to be engaged. That may not be the doctor’s office. We’ve seen a heavy focus on convenient healthcare delivered right in the pharmacy. Retail pharmacy has dramatically strengthened patient care in recent years, by adding thousands of clinics, expanding the role of the pharmacist, and developing multiple wellness services. Those points of care give brands and patients a chance to communicate and to learn.

Katherine Calvert, SVP, marketing, Outcome Health

Improving health outcomes for patients is the north star for all of us — patients, physicians, pharma, and healthcare marketers — and relevant, engaging point-of-care communications can do just that. The most successful brands tailor their broader DTC messages to the specific moment of the patient visit. What would you say if you were with your patient in the minutes before, during and after their consultation with their physician? The data proves that getting the right message to patients at the moment of care has a meaningful, positive impact on patient behavior: patients exposed to our platform were 31% more likely to fill a prescription and 34% more likely to take medication as prescribed than the control group. Thoughtfully curated brand content empowers patients to ask better questions, think differently about their conditions, and take more control over their health — and that’s a win for the whole ecosystem.

Linda Ruschau, chief client officer, PatientPoint

With empathy! Providers are increasingly pressed for time, and at the same time they want the information they need to provide quality patient care. We need to deliver information that is meaningful to their specialty succinctly and at a time and place that doesn’t disrupt their practice. We deliver real-time healthcare news and relevant information to providers from our pharma partners when and where care is delivered: it’s integrated into practice. For patients, information must be easy to understand, credible, and relatable. We’ve seen some fantastic marketing approaches in our point-of-care platforms to connect with patients. The use of testimonials, patient advocacy groups, and patient support programs all show that pharma cares.

John Kenyon, VP and managing director, point of care, Time Inc.

As pharma marketers increasingly rely on the efficiency of point-of-care media, it’s very important they recognize that clutter could potentially compromise the power of point of care. Content credibility and authority is paramount to physician acceptance and comfort with point-of-care content. The underlying power of this content lies in its ability to reach and educate specific patients at a level where they can self-assess their overall wellness and are prepared to have informed conversations with healthcare providers about a condition they either have or are now aware of. Fewer high quality initiatives are optimal for HCP’s comfort and will ensure achievement against any metric for success.

From the October 01, 2017 Issue of MM+M - Medical Marketing and Media