Why direct-to-patient is the future of pharma access (Sponsored)

0:00You're listening to a sponsored episode of The Top Line.

0:16Welcome, everyone. You're listening to The Top Line, brought to you by Fierce Biotech. I'm your host, Kelly Hogan. Today's guest has spent his career at the intersection of specialty pharmacy and pharmaceutical commercialization, and he's seen firsthand where the traditional model breaks down for patients. As Chief Commercial Officer at Gift Health, Jeremy Richardson is helping build What Comes Next, a direct-to-patient platform that has now guided more than 7 million patients through their prescription journey,

0:50from first bill to long-term adherence. In this episode, Jeremy makes the case that direct-to-patient isn't just for a narrow set of brands or categories, and that for pharma commercial teams, the question is no longer whether to pursue it, but how to unlock its full potential. Welcome, Jeremy. Thank you, Kelly. I appreciate you having me. So you came to Gift Health with deep roots in specialty pharmacy. What did that experience teach you about where patients were being underserved,

1:23and how did it shape your vision for what a better model could look like? Yeah, it's a really great question. Having spent, you know, over a decade in specialty pharmacy, I developed a tremendous and still have a tremendous amount of respect for the need that is served by the specialty pharmacy community. But the current model, and this isn't the fault of any individual specialty pharmacy, but just the overall model has created tremendous barriers to care. And the way that the patients are underserved is that they're being asked to navigate an incredibly complex system,

1:55multiple handoffs, and they're often asked to do this on their own. And what that creates is it creates confusion, not just confusion for the patients, but oftentimes the providers causes gaps and cause delays in therapy. So really, it's opened my eyes to the fact that we can create a seamless patient journey from end to end, and that's what we've been able to do in the DTP space. Pharma commercial teams are increasingly talking about DTP, but there's a wide range in how people define it and what they think it actually involves.

2:25What are the biggest misconceptions you hear from brand and commercial leaders when this topic comes up? Yeah, I think really where we can anchor ourselves here is that DTP is a pretty new concept, right? Over the last couple of years, it's evolved really tremendously. But I think some of the misconceptions that still exist, maybe not overall, but largely, is that DTP is for cash only. That DTP only works for consumer-driven medications, right? Think about GLP-1s. Some other cases that have been made that we, you know, had to refute is

2:56it only works for products with specific wax, right, or a specific price point, right, that it doesn't really serve the overall community. And all of those things, we've really disproven. We've shown that this model can work, you know, for retail medications, specialty light, specialty medications, at all different price points, all different therapeutic categories. When a DTP program is working the way it should, what does that actually look like operationally? What's happening between the moment a prescription is written and the moment a patient has their medication in hand

3:29that's different from the traditional model? So I'll kind of unpack the first part of the question first. What does this look like when it's successful? So to me, in our environment, I would say when a DTP program is successful, it's creating ease, right? It's creating ease and transparency both for the prescriber and also for the patients. And that's transparency not just with pricing, but also where am I at in my journey? What is required of me? What is the next step? What are the outcomes? Who's going to support me? You know, when you think about what is different from DTP versus,

4:01you know, the more traditional model is the communication and the pace are very different. So we're doing a lot of the same things that are done in the traditional space, but we're doing them differently. We're leveraging technology to help us with that pace. And we're making sure that we're engaging the patients throughout so that they stay comfortable and familiar with where they are. So you think about some of those, you know, traditional avenues that you have to work through with the patient, with the intake, right? Some things that sound very simple, but can get pretty complicated based upon the capabilities of pharmacies and where the script is being sent.

4:35Is it being sent to the right place from the start? So you think about intake, you think about BI or benefits investigation, BV, benefits verification, patient education and support throughout. You think about prior authorizations as payers and plans, you know, become more demanding and oftentimes more difficult to navigate. So what we're really doing is we're making sure that all these actions can take place and that they're happening on one seamless platform. And then it's one seamless journey for the patient. And ultimately what that means is you're solving problems for the patient and the provider

5:09and ultimately your manufacturer partners in that they want to get their patients on therapy faster. They want their patients to abandon less, right? It's a significant issue that we face. And they want their patients to persist longer in accordance with their therapy. And those are the questions and the platforms and the communication. Those are the answers to how we're solving that problem for the patients, the providers and ultimately the manufacturers as well. Gift Health has now guided more than 7 million patients through its DTP platform. What have you learned at that scale that you couldn't have known in theory?

5:41And how has that shaped what you believe manufacturers actually need from a partner? We've learned a lot. We've certainly learned a lot over the last, you know, couple of years as not only we have evolved, but as the market has evolved. But the expectation that we knew to be true, but we just needed more evidence to understand was how quickly patient expectations are evolving. I would say that's probably one of the most key learnings that we've found is that we live, and we knew that we did, but we live in a world where patients demand quick answers, oftentimes immediate answers.

6:14We live in a world of immediate gratification. And DTP has proven that can also be a reality in the pharmacy space, in the healthcare space. And we've been able to leverage the platform to get that information to the patients more quickly so that they have that transparency and they have it in the moment where they need it so you're not leaving patients waiting. So I'd say the reality of showing patients the other ways that they conduct business in their lives can also be done in the healthcare space and specifically the pharmacy space as well. For a brand team that's aligned on DTP and ready to move,

6:45what are the biggest opportunities in front of them when standing up a program, and how do they make sure they capture them? Yeah, this is a really critical question that we're asking to every one of our potential partners, right, every conversation that we're having, is this isn't meant to be a one-size-fits-all, right? It's truly understanding the specific market dynamics, right? Whether that be the market dynamics of the therapeutic category or the manufacturer, for the specific brand, understanding those market dynamics, what are the impacts to your patients and the providers and the payers that you're working with?

7:20What are the challenges and opportunities? And so I think as you identify, you know, some of those most immediate and some of those most prevalent needs and challenges, you think of time to first fill, you think of abandonment, you think of time on therapy, right? Some of those categories that we spoke about a bit earlier, is understanding like where is the biggest need or the most critical need to your specific patient population? That's critical. And then really making sure that you're capturing is the how. How are we going to do this? Now that we understand the environment, how are we going to solve those problems?

7:53And largely, we have to continue to lean into and leverage the technology that's in front of us. It's evolved very quickly. I think that while technology will continue to press us forward, it'll continue to help us to improve. We also can't lose sight of that human touch. We've got to make sure that we always have that human touch. There's always going to be a preference for patients to have that. And that will remain critical. And the last piece that I would say is creating really clear business rules. When you're designing, what do you want this patient journey to feel like?

8:23What do you want this script journey to feel like? As you're working to create and evolve and provide a more simple path to care for these patients, I think you have to begin with the end in mind from that capacity. What do you want that experience to truly be? And finally, if you could tell every pharma commercial VP listening right now, one thing about where the prescription journey is headed over the next three years, what would it be? One thing. If I had to boil it down to one thing, I would say that, and I wouldn't say this is novel, but I would say that patients are increasingly demanding greater ease in the prescription journey.

8:58We must continue to evolve the way we think, the tactical practices toward creating that ease for the patients to meet them where they are. And like I alluded to earlier, I don't think we can do this without continuing to evolve and leverage the technology in front of us, but make sure that we're leveraging that technology to ultimately impact the patients, the providers, the partners that we have, because those demands will continue to rise. And I think it gives us the opportunity to show patients that we can do this in a new and novel way. Thank you very much for your insights today, Jeremy.

9:29And thank you for joining us on this episode of The Top Line. Once again, I'm your host, Kelly Hogan, and that's The Bottom Line from The Top Line.