5 ways to smartly manage your market access information using digital applications

In this update, Bharath Rao, Product Owner, explores 5 common anxieties experienced by market access professionals when managing information, and shares news of some exciting developments in technologies that enable smooth collaboration and smarter working.

Strategy may be queen or king in policy, access, value, and evidence, but the underpinning insights-led information does not develop itself. Rather, it is a team effort of frictionless and responsive collaboration across functions and geographies, from local affiliates to global executives.

In the unpredictable, fast-moving world of policy, access, value, and evidence, improving how information and resultant game-changing insights are developed, reviewed, and shared is a valuable time and cost-saving activity that could be overlooked.

Digital applications that enable market access professionals to focus on what they’re best at

PRMA Consulting is a member of Fishawack Health and, within our digital team, our focus is on defining the problems, pain points, and behaviors of our users (including but not limited to medical writers, country affiliates, and global HEOR and market access leads) when collaborating on the development of market access information.

Our digital applications free up more time for users to focus on high-value, strategic activities, with less time spent on cutting and pasting, finding the right versions of documents, navigating multi-step approval processes, and other activities that take up resources and energy that would be better used elsewhere.

How digital applications help increase efficiencies and improve decision-making within market access

A key aim for market access professionals is to collaborate cross-functionally and navigate conversations internally to pull out important access drivers.

Through our clients and our diverse team of market access consultants, we have built an understanding of what really matters and are using this to advance our unique digital applications with the user in mind.

5 common anxieties when managing market access information

1. “I wish I didn’t have to spend time copying and pasting the same information across different documents.”

Creating and evolving market access information in one application (rather than across multiple documents, slide decks, PDFs, emails, etc.) doesn’t just mean an end to unnecessary copy pasting. An application that acts as a single source of truth also provides potentially huge time savings, significantly reducing capacity for user error and lengthy searches, increasing alignment between global and local affiliate teams, and allowing for a more fluid and focused collaboration.

Whether it is combining information across hundreds of HTA and regulatory decisions with our expert consultant-led insights and recommendations (PRMA Tracker®), or navigating between the situation analysis for early-pipeline, HTA-focused, or Asia-Pacific-specific assessments, while identifying and linking market-specific evidence gaps, key drivers, and evidence generation activities (PRMA Healthcheck®), our digital applications provide a way to do it in a single browser tab and a handful of clicks.

2. “What’s the latest version of our market access submission? v4.5_FINAL? Or 4.4_FINAL_FINAL?”

Despite SharePoint’s best efforts, it can be an exhausting challenge to keep track of optimal routes to market across dozens of different versions of GVDs, submission templates, value stories, etc.

That’s why we are optimizing the in-app content editing of our applications, starting with the development of domain-specific situation analysis content for assessments within the PRMA Healthcheck® . This means being confident in knowing that you are viewing or working on the most up-to-date information straight from the fingers of our subject matter experts, without the need to remember and search for the SharePoint folder the Global HEOR Manager referred you to last week (or it was last month?).

3. “Not all comments seem to have been addressed in this version”

Another peril of multiple document types across cross-functional teams is that comments from stakeholders can easily slip through the cracks. To address this, we are trialing an in-line commenting functionality across our applications. It means content developers, editors, reviewers, and approvers can leave comments for the author or each other that can be directly related to text, images, or tables, allowing content to be developed smoothly in-app.

4. “Who changed this paragraph/image/table? When? Why?”

In-app editing can make some users feel uneasy. We are all very accustomed to Word, PowerPoint, et al. Certainly, among the market access professionals that we have spoken to, we know that there is a lack of reassurance in editing information inside an application, rather than the cozy confines of a Microsoft product. That is why we are currently trialing autosave as you type and in-line tracking of changes, with ability to manage all amends in-app. All users with permissions could see what was changed, by who and when. These edits could then be accepted, rejected, or queried without ever leaving your browser tab.

But we are realistic enough to not be aiming to replace Microsoft when it comes to full-scale document versioning, which is why our US and EU-patented submission autopopulation application (PRMA Navigator®), allows integration with a Microsoft Word add-in when combing information across dozens of HTA submissions or supporting documents which will continue to be distributed in Word format for the foreseeable future.

5. “I don’t feel comfortable working in applications in case I overwrite someone else’s work”

Another potential pitfall of in-app content editing is the fear of overwriting someone else’s work. To get around this, we are currently developing the first phase of concurrent editing capabilities in the PRMA Healthcheck® and PRMA Tracker®.

Concurrent editing allows users/authors to work together in real-time, knowing they can update information in-app without deleting or ruining someone else’s previous work, nor overwriting changes being made by another user at the same time, with only the person sharing the session being able to save the information updates.

Concurrent editing shortens the review cycle and means little or no risk of conflicting versions of the same document.

Transform your market access processes with our suite of unique digital applications

PRMA Consulting’s unique digital applications are already helping leading biopharma clients achieve top-line organizational goals.

PRMA Healthcheck® dynamically assess market access risks and opportunities, linking global thinking to affiliate needs and maximizing the value of assets across a portfolio at all stages of development.
PRMA Navigator® helps shorten the time to market access and improve submission quality through a unique auto population technology and integration with Microsoft Word documents.
PRMA Tracker® informs payer evaluation and HTA strategy, enabling adaptation to evolving payer expectations powered by our expert market access consultants.

From our colleagues at Policy Analysis Inc. (PAI), a member of Fishawack Health:

hēRo3 allows HEOR teams to build highly technical models in a fraction of the time that it takes in Excel, while providing animated and interactive outputs that are easily digestible, so companies can answer critical market access questions in real-time.

Take a step towards seamless co-creation

Does our vision resonate with what you are experiencing in your role? Are you interested in helping to shape the future of market access collaboration? If so, get in touch to help join us in championing the future standard of co-creation in market access.

Further reading