While it’s impossible to quantify the impact of medical innovation on the world of cancer care in recent years, it has clearly been significant. Though cures remain elusive, a host of treatments and drugs have emerged as critical tools in the fight against cancer.
But to hear Outcomes4Me founder and CEO Maya Said tell it, all of that innovation is useless if it doesn’t reach patients. That’s why her organization, which markets a direct-to-patient cancer navigation platform, has inked two high-profile partnerships in recent months. It’s working with Labcorp to empower patients through precision oncology and with Comcast NBCUniversal’s Forecast Labs to democratize access to care through mass media.
By relying on a combination of AI and evidence-based research, Said says she hopes to proactively engage patients who could be at risk of being diagnosed with cancer and jumpstart their care journeys.
The Labcorp partnership is about achieving personalization by way of specialty biomarker testing, including comprehensive genomic profiling. The company will provide personalized insights so that Outcomes4Me can identify the cancer patients who should undergo further diagnostic testing. Labcorp will also provide Outcomes4Me with marketing services, such as point-of-care promotion, at select locations.
As for the NBCUniversal partnership, Said explained that it uses a mass-media approach to reach the right patients. By blanketing the airwaves, Outcomes4Me hopes to eliminate the middleman and engage patients directly.
“Today, often how patients find database information is either through healthcare organizations, doctors or providers,” Said explains. “In some sense, there’s an intermediary there — whereas going through NBCUniversal and the world of mass media, it’s about that direct bond.”
Outcomes4Me’s first goal is to raise the profile of biomarker testing. Its ultimate aim is to speed the path to treatment, given that every moment counts in cancer care.
The organization often partners with drugmakers to provide precision marketing and education for its target audiences. Said characterizes this as a win-win situation: pharma gets access to patient populations, while patients receive information that could inform their care decisions.
Said believes that manufacturers want to upgrade the patient experience and predicts that, in the years ahead, pharma marketers will angle to create connected customized programs that navigate patients through their treatment.
“That’s the next leap in impacting patient empowerment, because it’s about connecting the patient journey around the point of care,” she predicts. “It all comes back to the point of care — but it’s not only about empowering the patient. It’s also about empowering the patient and the doctor to activate that connection.”
