There comes a point in life when one comes under the umbrella of rules and regulations.  At times, these regulations don’t seem to add much benefit and, in a way, restrict activity unless an individual or an organization is ready to harness this change into something beneficial.

The pharmaceutical industry is on the verge of witnessing more and more diversity. Unless it’s able to harness and use compliance to get more insights and fine-tune its sales force, the disclosure initiatives will feel like a burden on a daily business.

The case for data analytics

Pharma disclosure codes have been around for a decade. However, these codes have seen more action than ever in the past few years in terms of their implication. The first major step in this regard was the US Sunshine Act enacted in February of 2013 and the EFPIA Disclosure Code of 2013, which was made applicable to its 33 member national associations.

As per the EFPIA disclosure code, member companies started disclosing all transfer of value to HCPs and HCOs on an annual basis, with the first reporting period being 2015.

Two questions continue to lie ahead for pharma companies now. Should they place efforts on compliance and let it burden them? Or should they offset it by taking a step further and getting the best out of this data by applying analytics and fine-tuning their sales and marketing force strategy? This means not just collecting data related to aggregate expenditures but using it in various ways to:

– Gain insight into promotional expenditures

– Acquire better customer insights by implementing transparency in enterprise-wide HCP and HCO activities

– Avoid breach of codes, legal actions, and financial penalties by fine-tuning HCP and HCO interactions

– Initiate better budget allocation for the identification of non-value adding activities

The need for Pharma companies is to use their data to comply and stand out!