By Jeff Cartwright-Smith, Ph.D., Senior Vice President and Andrew Douglas, Vice President

One of the most common requests we hear from clients is to determine, from among many plausible criteria, which ones drive prescribing. Answering this question drives us, in turn, to dig deeply into the marketing science tool kit. We’d like to share some of the techniques used to address this challenge.

The challenge may be presented in the context of a survey of physician perceptions of drug attributes: Of perhaps 20 brand characteristics rated by active prescribers, on which attributes should our client focus limited marketing resources? Or it may come up in the context of a sales force effectiveness survey such as our Detail Tracker or Detail Watch, or a corporate communications program. Or it may be asked in a message effectiveness survey: Which messages, or rep characteristics or sales tactics are effective and which are not? The intended outcome measure is usually an increase in prescribing, measured either in self-reported brand share or secondary script data (NRx).

Originally published in 2007, “A Second Opinion: Rescuing America’s Health Care,” a book by Dr. Arnold S. Relman, may be even more relevant in 2010 as “reform” makes its way through the U.S. Congress and exemplifies the kind of piecemeal Band-Aid fix that Dr. Relman believes will not work.

According to Dr. Relman, we must stop viewing the health care system as a market, stop talking about competition among its major stakeholders and start viewing it as the unique, important area of endeavor it really is. He sees the need for a one-payer system and this payer would be not-for-profit and funded by a special graduated health care tax.  

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