The challenge
A leading biopharma company addressing inflammatory diseases identified a major new opportunity: U.S. patients with severe renal impairment had a six-fold higher prevalence of gout than those with normal kidney function.
Historically, the company’s provider network focused almost entirely on rheumatologists. But with twice as many nephrologists practicing in the U.S., the potential for market expansion was significant.
Yet the challenge was clear: The team had no relationships with nephrologists, no understanding of their diagnostic and treatment practices and limited bandwidth to conduct large-scale research. They needed answers to key questions fast:
- How do we approach this market?
- What are nephrologists focused on?
- What challenges do they face in treating gout alongside kidney disease?
- How can we position our product to change diagnosis and treatment behaviors?
The company’s traditional advisory-board model (tied to in-person congresses once or twice a year) couldn’t provide the speed or scale required. Searching for alternatives, they turned to ExtendMed’s Health Expert Connect™ platform to explore a faster, more cost-effective way to engage experts and gather insights.
ExtendMed’s solution
Once ExtendMed was selected as a partner, the company framed its nephrology outreach as a pilot project to validate the technology and prove its value before broader deployment.
Using Health Expert Connect™, ExtendMed helped the company launch a structured, nine-month engagement program that blended asynchronous discussions, surveys and focus groups to collect feedback from nephrologists representing both academic and community practices—including several kidney-transplant specialists.
The platform enabled the team to:
- Collect questionnaire data to understand practice size and focus areas
- Perform chart audits to evaluate real-world treatment trends
- Share interactive visual sales aids before release to test message clarity and effectiveness
This virtual approach enabled the company to run multiple insight-gathering activities simultaneously, saving months of time compared to conventional advisory board cycles.
As the pilot progressed, the team began identifying additional opportunities to use ExtendMed’s platform—such as sharing best practices, clinical guidelines and curated research articles—to support and educate clinicians in this new therapeutic space continuously.
The results
The pilot program successfully transformed how the company engaged an entirely new specialist audience. Within months, the team was connecting with nephrologists every six weeks on average, maintaining consistent dialogue and building relationships that positioned them for faster market entry.
Specific outcomes included:
- More frequent and consistent contact with nephrology stakeholders
- Strategic updates to materials based on real-time advisor feedback
- Greater collaboration between academic and community clinicians
- Expanded use of the platform into the company’s core rheumatology programs
- Speed established as a competitive advantage in entering the new market
ExtendMed empowers medical affairs and market research teams to connect with new provider audiences faster, smarter and more cost-effectively.
