The challenge
Launching its first therapy, the company needed to raise awareness and engage clinicians and patients long before approval—but lacked field staff or a salesforce to do it.
Relying on conferences and email chains was unrealistic. They required a way to connect local medical-affairs leaders with nationwide stakeholders quickly and affordably. The team also needed to:
- Identify key investigators and community clinicians likely to prescribe the new therapy.
- Understand reimbursement and diagnostic barriers across regions.
- Build continuous, not one-off, relationships that could evolve through launch.
ExtendMed’s solution
Using ExtendMed’s Health Expert Connect™ platform, the company launched a fully virtual stakeholder-engagement program that combined synchronous and asynchronous collaboration to rapidly collect insights and build lasting relationships.
Clinicians were engaged through virtual discussions and surveys to uncover real-world barriers such as whether required diagnostic tests were covered by insurance, if prior authorization was needed and whether payers had adequate evidence to support coverage. These insights guided launch planning and reduced risk early in the process.
The medical affairs team also segmented and prioritized audiences by reviewing investigators from earlier trials and conferences, collaborating with an agency to identify additional specialists and grouping stakeholders by therapeutic focus and geography. This structure enabled a focused and efficient approach to engagement.
To maintain momentum, the company established quarterly engagement contracts that blended two to four virtual meetings per year with asynchronous discussion boards, keeping communication and collaboration active between sessions. Patient advocates were also brought in early through advocacy networks to share firsthand perspectives on diagnosis, treatment challenges and patient experience—helping the team embed patient centricity throughout the launch plan.
The results
Even without previous launches to benchmark, leaders estimated 2–3 times more engagement than traditional outreach could achieve. The program improved decision speed and coverage readiness, while advancing patient-centric strategy.
Key outcomes included:
- 2–3× higher engagement across stakeholder segments.
- Faster insight turnaround for launch planning.
- Earlier payer and patient input to refine strategy.
- Six-month lead over competitors entering the same market.
By engaging stakeholders virtually and frequently, the company built credibility, trust and actionable understanding that translated directly into launch success.
