CLIENT CASE STUDY

Kids with a rare disease get a helping hand

For children with a specific rare, genetic condition, diagnosis is no longer a death sentence; a leading biotech company developed a new drug to treat the condition. Supporting services, ready for the drug’s launch, would offer patients and their families a lifeline. In only five months, Accenture helped develop and maintain the patient services platform to improve drug access and orchestrate the ongoing treatment that patients need to live a long and fulfilling life.

Teddy Bear

ACCESS
TO LIFE-SAVING DRUGS

Imagine that you’re a parent whose child was just diagnosed with a rare, debilitating and potentially fatal genetic condition—every family’s worst nightmare.

Where do you go, and who do you turn to? A leading biotech company wanted to help these families put the nightmare behind them. It developed a drug to help treat the condition, but wanted to have a support system in place for families in time for the drug’s launch. Support services would help patients access the care they need over their lifetimes. The company needed robust and flexible capabilities to foster closer relationships with the children, their families, and a complex array of medical specialists and caregivers throughout treatment. It collaborated with Accenture to create and maintain a patient services technology platform that would help families access the drug and get the support they need.

COUNTDOWN
TO FDA APPROVAL

The company tapped Accenture’s Intelligent Patient Services capabilities to deliver a patient services platform in only five months—in time for the medicine’s fast-tracked FDA approval. Working closely with business counterparts, the team used an agile delivery methodology to adjust the solution as the service design for the new product evolved. The Salesforce Service Cloud solution supports the requirements of the new drug but allows the platform to grow as the company’s portfolio of products and related patient services expand.

Answering “What Next?”

Diagnosis with the life-altering disease can be a trying time for patients and their families. The service enabled by the platform helps them answer “what next?” after diagnosis. Once patients are prescribed the medication, the service helps to ease the transition on to the treatment.

It orchestrates a complex care management program consisting of financial assistance, insurance benefits investigations, logistical assistance like transport services to treatment centers, and product education for patients and their families. Nursing support helps patients and parents understand what the treatment entails. Without this tool, the burden to connect these dots would fall to families and their doctors.

Countdown to FDA Approval

FASTER, BETTER
TREATMENT

The service is a hand to hold for patients and their families, helping them access care quickly and easily connect with their network of specialists. In just four weeks post-launch, more than 600 patients had started the onboarding process to the platform with 22 already starting on the therapy. The consistency of care throughout treatment is having a remarkable impact on outcomes:

  • Patients are getting on their therapy much more quickly and with infinitely better support from the healthcare system, helping to leap initial hurdles after diagnosis.
  • Patients and their families can track the treatment journey.
  • Healthcare providers get greater support in caring for their patients improving quality, affordability and engagement. Caregivers can track and support a patient’s progress in real time to improve adherence.
  • With the administrative burden lifted, doctors can focus on patients, emotional support for families and delivering consistent treatment.
  • Pharmacies get all the information they need to fill the prescription, eliminating unnecessary follow-ups with physicians and patients.
  • Integrated third-party data and segmentation by patient group, product, therapy or geography are helping the company provide more tailored services and useful information for the patient.
  • The company is increasing revenues by reducing the likelihood of patients being prescribed the medication, but not getting it due to financial barriers.

With its powerful, scalable new service and platform, the company is helping young patients access life-saving treatment faster and improve their health outcomes.

RELATED CONTENT