Patient Support Program (CSP) PSPs play an important role in helping patients get the treatment they need, improve adherence, and optimize disease management. However, both in Taiwan and the United States, the rollout and utilization of these programs are often lower than expected, and there are still multiple obstacles.
Obstacle 1: Only a small number of patients are aware of the Patient Support Program
Lack of awareness of patient support programs is one of the main reasons hindering their adoption. Studies have shown that nearly 60% of U.S. patients have little or no knowledge of available drug support programs. The situation is similar in Taiwan, where there is a significant lack of awareness of such programs among patients and physicians. The main reason is regulatory clarity and compliance management, which makes it necessary for plan providers to communicate with the market carefully.
In Taiwan’s medical system, the medical system mainly relies on the universal health insurance system, and most patients do not have much burden on medical expenses, so there are mainly newly marketed self-financed special drugs for patient support programs; The trend of health insurance and commercial insurance payment policies will also affect the motivation strategy of the patient support plan for providers. In the United States, according to the survey, 42% of American doctors do not know what patient support programs are available for patients.
Barrier 2: Patient benefit is insufficient
Even if they are aware of the existence of a patient support program, patients and physicians will not join if they do not see the benefits of participating.
Nearly half of U.S. patients believe that pharmaceutical companies don’t understand their needs, and thus doubt whether the program will really help them. Taiwan’s Patient Support Program is primarily designed to supplement the gaps in universal health coverage, but if it fails to get to the point that patients in the real target population receive ultimate help, and thus fail to make it easier and affordable for patients to get prescription drugs, they will lack the incentive to participate. In addition to the patient support program to reduce the burden, most of the patient compliance support services depend on solving the problems that cause disadvantage to patients in medical administration, and there are similar dilemmas in Taiwan and the United States. These are part of the Medical Support Service that patients sometimes don’t know clearly. For doctors, it is also considered not to be in their own interests.
As a result, patient support programs have become a new work station in the medical journey, and how to reduce the administrative burden such as prior authorization, thereby saving medical administrative time, which would otherwise affect the willingness to adopt. Eleven percent of U.S. medical professionals believe that the time it takes to understand patient support programs outweighs the value they provide. In Taiwan, due to the existence of the universal health insurance system, the administrative work of doctors when handling cases is relatively simple, and the patient support program is more challenging when it enters clinical services.
Obstacle 3: The program is too complex and the user experience is poor
An overly complex, logged-in, and easy-to-use patient support program is inevitably difficult to attract to patients and physicians. 80% of patients in the U.S. already prefer to use digital means to interact with healthcare facilities, and if a support program fails to provide a smooth experience, patients are likely to abandon or become controversial unless there is significant compelling use.
In Taiwan, although it is a technologically advanced region, the digital transformation of medical services is still ongoing. Taiwanese patients expect a seamless, user-friendly digital platform If patient support programs fail to break through the barriers of digital management and effectiveness, the likelihood of project-based patient support programs will be reduced.
In addition, healthcare providers in both Taiwan and the U.S. face challenges such as heavy administrative burdens and tight staffing, and they have little time to roll out if the planning process is too cumbersome to integrate into existing workflows.
PATIENTSFORCE’S COPING STRATEGIES
In order to increase the adoption rate of the Patient Support Program in Taiwan, PATIENSFORCE has been continuously innovating the patient support model, and in line with the health insurance benefit policy and commercial insurance strategy, the third affordable new drug support program includes:
1. In line with the trend of the government’s medical payment policy, we propose innovative support strategies to drug providers, in addition to the drug donation management plan and system that comply with regulations, and the new PSP solution for the out-of-pocket drug costs or medical materials of various disease types, and the patient-centered needs.
2. Strengthen the provision of appropriate program information to patients and physicians, and provide access to patient support programs through policy and industry-based advocacy through policy and industry-based advocacy under the compliance of medical regulations.
3. Streamline the planning process and develop a friendly digital and open platform PATIENTSFORCE’s Patient Support Management System (PATIENTSFORCE) has completed the implementation of large-scale services in Taiwan, and thousands of physicians are already using the platform to provide patient support medication applications, and to provide patients and caregivers with a better understanding of the patient support journey The system has been awarded the National Healthcare Quality Award Seal by the Medical Policy Council.
4. Integrate planning into physicians’ existing workflows and provide additional tools such as auto-filling forms to reduce the additional burden. It is currently developing the direction and actively cooperating with the medical system factory.
5. Continuously optimize and develop plans based on data insights to meet the needs of different stages. Recently, some drug providers have used the benefits of real-world data as evidence to apply for health insurance benefits after completing the service, which also makes the data management service of PSP demonstrate its value.
The particularity of the patient support plan is different from the service management of clinical trials, in addition to the need for a deeper understanding of the local medical environment and user needs, and the adoption of a localized strategy tailored to the conditions of the disease In addition to the compliance management in the first place, the flexible needs and large-scale services that meet the greatest common divisor of customers, so that drug providers can obtain clearer strategic benefits, is the ability of PATIENTSFORCE to continuously increase in innovative services
Zhang Xiangxin, General Manager of PATIENTSFORCE Caihong Health Integration Group
