Selecting a Provider of Compliant Technology Solutions for Life Sciences

Finding the right-fit provider of commercial solutions is overwhelming but critical to ensure regulatory compliance, streamline operations, and drive business growth in life sciences. We put together a tip sheet to help navigate the selection process, so you can choose a provider that checks all your boxes for sampling services, CRM, data management, analytics, and beyond.

1. Look for expertise in life sciences and the regulatory landscape
   Given the complexity of commercial operations in life sciences, product sampling programs require strict tracking and specialized strategies. Guidelines from PDMA and federal and state governments deepen these intricacies, touching every aspect of the supply chain. The right provider should have concentrated expertise in the industry, thus, in your business.
2. Assess technology capabilities and the partnership network
   A thorough assessment ensures providers have the technological aptitude to achieve your goals. Established providers often have an extensive network of trusted partners, which can provide convenient access to complementary services and technology solutions.
3. Evaluate configuration and integration competencies
   Technology must adapt and evolve as your initiatives, requirements, and SOPs do the same. The right provider should be able to configure and integrate solutions with existing systems and third-party vendors to ensure consistency and compliance.
4. Consider all customer support, service, and training offerings
   It’s not enough to say “client-focused” or “service-oriented.” Is the team responsive? Available? Skilled in effective product management? Knowledgeable of life sciences regulations? Successful implementation and relationships require depth in dedication.
5. Scrutinize the provider’s reputation and history of success
   Reputation indicates a provider’s ability to deliver on promises and provide reliable solutions. This can be assessed through customer reviews, testimonials, case studies, and workplace awards—all offering instant validation of positive engagements, credibility, and trust.
6. Determine compliance track record and data security measures
   Providers handle sensitive, confidential information. Failure to protect it can result in significant legal, financial, and reputational consequences. Therefore, certifications, audits, and other relevant qualifications uncover a track record of compliance with regulatory standards.
7. Assess pricing and consider any hidden fees or long-term costs
   Assessing pricing and considering hidden fees or long-term costs facilitates informed decisions based on financial resources and goals. By understanding the total cost of a provider’s solution, a company can determine if it’s a cost-effective and sustainable investment.
8. Select a provider with all the above and beyond
   Synergistix has 25+ years as a provider of technology and compliance solutions engineered for commercial aspects of life sciences. With superior technical expertise, we support field and home office personnel in achieving compliant programs across operations.
9. Highly configurable, scalable, and compliant solutions
10. Full-service, in-house, expert support team and call center
11. Dedicated account managers and technical specialists
12. Strategic vendor partnerships for end-to-end commercial development

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The life sciences industry loves a total solution. However, this isn’t the case when navigating direct-to-practitioner (DTP) sampling. Elite DTP sample management separates technology and program oversite from fulfillment activities for streamlined rule and regulatory adherence.

Some fulfillment houses are tech-savvy, but sampling isn’t their core focus. They might only offer sample management to check off a box. And at larger fulfillment houses, IT teams don’t fall under the right brand or report to the right group, which gives them little control over DTP samples. Leveraging a fulfillment house for sampling solutions means partnering with a company that might not offer the depth of capabilities or resources needed or that’s slow to adapt to tech and industrial changes.

When you look beyond fulfillment houses, however, you find specialists who understand the nuances of DTP sampling and specialize in what truly fuels your growth and commercial success. Before getting locked in a relationship that might not deliver in the long run, consider the perks of separating sample management from fulfillment activities and partnering with a true expert in DTP sampling.

Avoid Common Pitfalls

In a recent study, nearly half of primary care practices reported having a drug rep visit weekly. About 60% reported that their practice had a sample closet—a designated area used to store free samples.¹ Often, this is where drug samples go to expire or are given out freely, which has its own set of repercussions. Uncoordinated sampling programs like these leave significant money on the table.

A company specializing in sampling focuses solely on ensuring DTP samples compliantly and effectively reach healthcare professionals (HCPs), enabling better ROI on sampling programs over time. Some fulfillment houses lack internal IT resources and lean on specialists to leverage their sampling solutions and capabilities, support the backend, and keep up with an ever-evolving industry. Yet, it’s still more advantageous to work directly with specialists who take the most thoughtful and coordinated approach to sampling.

Pharmaceutical and medical device manufacturers then have more freedom and flexibility in the fulfillment vendor sphere. For example, they can try new vendors that specialize in ambient vs. frozen or refrigerated delivery without compromising or having to rebuild compliance processes and business rules.

Sampling Made Smart

Synergistix is a leading provider of life sciences technology and compliance solutions, immersed in sampling, CRM, and data management and analytics every single day. In fact, we’re one of the specialists that large fulfillment centers often tap for tailored and continually evolving sampling solutions, centralized rule management, and independent program oversite.

What makes our approach “smart” is our technology and deep understanding of compliance paired with unique program rules that we can standardize across multiple programs in place. Through independent program oversite, we account for every step of the sampling process, ensuring DTP samples and starting units get in the hands of patients and practitioners—not the back of a sample closet.

Smart sampling programs require depth in three business facets: technology around your systems, deep knowledge of the subject, and a commitment to service and partnership.

1. Technology
   SampleIQ is the engine that drives smart sampling. It automates processes to optimize inventory and reconciliation data collection, ensuring DTP samples compliantly reach HCPs and enabling better ROI on sampling programs.
2. Expertise
   SampleIQ can be programmed to rules and guidance, but that only takes sampling so far. We have superior technical competencies and a deep understanding of industry regulations to support representatives and managers in commercial growth.
3. Partnership
   SampleIQ is backed by a full-service call center, 100% onshore support team, direct relationship with account managers, and single contact for request tracking, issue resolution, and project planning.

Specialized Tech & Support from Synergistix

Bottom line: fulfillment companies are great at fulfillment and physically handling products, which is why we leave that up to them. We’re great at compliance and DTP sampling. So, who do you want to run your technology?

Contact Synergistix to learn more about our smart sampling solutions and expansive partnership network that can help you nail down strategic vendors for fulfillment and 3PL services.

Sources:

1. https://lowninstitute.org/the-true-cost-of-free-samples/

That’s a wrap! In case you missed it, we just held the Synergistix 18th Annual Collaboration Conference with peers and thought leaders in life sciences. After a couple years of virtual ambiguity, our team was back in person in Fort Lauderdale, FL, with a stacked group of sampling, CRM, and data professionals—including our very own team of Synergistians. Together, we expanded our networks, tuned into insightful presentations, and explored catalysts for commercial success in the pharmaceutical and medical device industry.

We left the week with a new outlook on sampling solutions, CRM ecosystems, effective sales teams, compliance and efficiency, and much more. Here are some speaker highlights:

• Terra Buckley, JD, VP & Head of Compliance Advisory Services, MedPro
  Do you ever notice tension between what your business leaders ask of your CRM and what Legal and Compliance say is required? In this keynote session, Terra discussed the landscape of various field-based roles and the compliance trends driving configuration decisions, sharing various risk and mitigation strategies to employ when meeting with compliance partners.
• Spencer White, Senior Director, Avion Pharmaceuticals
  In a world and industry with no shortage of shifts and evolutions, flexibility and agility are key to enterprise scaling. Spencer taught us to respond to change with digital solutions as quickly as possible to stay on top of the market.
• April Loncao, Account Executive, Synergistix
  The customer experience (CX) is a large part of every conversation these days. April dived into the power of perspective and empathy in the CX, which gave all of us a new outlook on how to understand the feelings of others, respond to them, and share our own.
• Wendy Wolf, President & Founder, ImpactBio
  Gaining momentum in just about every industry is “quiet quitting” and“quick quitting.” Quiet quitting refers to putting in minimum effort just to get by, and quick quitting refers to leaving rather than sticking around to see a change. Wendy walked the group through both trends, sharing strategies to retain top talent in today’s age.

We were also joined by Greg Gironda of Odyssey Health, Jackie Markle of AstraZeneca, Matt Hutcheson of Tegra Analytics, and Rick Wichmann of Synergistix, who shared incredible words about launch excellence, data accessibility, everyday statistics, and privacy at work. Thank you to everyone who shared a piece of their professionalism—you really brought it!

As you can tell, much of the 2023 Collaboration Conference went beyond the scope of sampling, CRM, and data solutions. Because, at the end of the day, success is more than that. It’s about how we work with each other and our customers. When we come together, the industry evolves as a whole. And it’s not just about us. We’re fueling critical strides in life sciences, accelerating commercial growth for healthcare partners focused on better patient outcomes.

We left feeling energized and empowered when we returned home from the 2023 Collaboration Conference. We can’t wait to apply this new industry knowledge, and we are already looking forward to next year. Thank you to everyone who joined and participated. You made the week one to remember!

Contact Synergistix to learn more about where we’ve been and where we’re going. We lead the industry in helping others build highly effective teams, lasting customer relationships, and sustainable business growth—and we can help you do the same.

An effective sample management program is integral to commercial success for pharmaceutical and, in some instances, medical device manufacturers. In short, sample management and sample accountability refer to the logistics of reconciling sample inventories to ensure adherence and compliance to PDMA regulations and guidelines in addition to maintaining an appropriate supply of samples. With an effective sampling program comes increased market access and additional commercial success, which brings on the need to automate as many processes as possible in an effort to modernize sample management.

Hand sampling requires a sales representative to physically visit a medical office to transfer samples to a healthcare professional (HCP). Alternatively, some HCPs prefer direct-to-practitioner (DTP) sampling, where sales representatives don’t carry the samples themselves. Instead, they’re stored in a warehouse and shipped directly to their offices.

At the end of the day, hand sampling and DTP sampling programs have one common goal: compliantly providing samples to HCPs. Let’s consider the difficulties each type of program confronts.

Hand Sampling Challenges

• White spaces and field vacancies that remain untapped by inside teams
• Low-touch HCPs that sales representatives don’t (or can’t) target

DTP Sampling Challenges

• Lack of integration between steps in the process from ordering to fulfillment
• Appropriate allocation of samples for optimal distribution

What’s Smart Sampling?

Traditionally, a field representative drops off a sample and collects the HCP’s signature via the CRM or paper form to ensure the appropriate capture of information for reconciliation and auditing purposes. Smart sampling solutions seek to replace paper and manual processes, thereby optimizing the collection of inventory and reconciliation data. Audits are conducted and made available via the system for home offices or sample accountability analysts to read and view electronically, visualize checkpoints, ensure inventories are accurate, and facilitate sample distribution.

Smart sampling contributes significantly to innovation and continuous improvement across both small and large life sciences companies. Comprehensive smart sampling solutions also strongly focus on total customer support, from implementation to sample management and market access.

Why Smart Sampling?

Smart sampling solutions combine the technology and support required to optimize sample management, which enhances the entire sales process and product lifecycle.

• Ensure Regulatory Compliance
  Sample operations must reconcile the quantity of samples representatives receive and the quantity of samples provided to HCPs to certify adherence to regulatory protocols. Smart sampling solutions validate all FDA procedures and requirements and PDMA guidelines, incorporating system integration features to adapt to process nuances as agency protocols change. As life sciences regulations evolve, smart sampling helps prevent drug, product, technology, and process diversion, ultimately driving compliance and accountability.

• Meet Customer Requirements
  There are many factors throughout a sample management program: sampling methods, timelines, documentation, SOPs, storage, transportation, and so on. Smart sampling solutions must be able to adapt to these unique business needs and priorities. It’s critical to take a collaborative approach throughout the implementation process, discussing and configuring a smart sampling plan relative to a client’s business rules and product. Ultimately, the goal is to develop sampling programs consistent with these needs and effective for compliance.

• Optimize Sales Force Effectiveness
  Sample accountability and reconciliation require deep consideration and continual effort from inside teams. Automated processes and responsive, reliable support shift the commercial team’s focus from manual processes to valuable HCP relations. Tech works best when paired with real people and hands-on partners, which is why smart sampling providers don’t aim to take representatives out of the program but rather enhance the overall sampling process.

Partner with the Pioneers of Smart Sampling

Pharmaceutical, diagnostics, biotech, and medical device companies often run hundreds of trials simultaneously. With billions of dollars and thousands of team members invested, plus sample services from multiple third-party vendors, the cost of inefficiency can quickly escalate.¹ Regardless of business size or budget, sales processes must be designed to profit.

Synergistix provides high-quality smart sampling solutions backed by comprehensive customer support for commercial success in life sciences. SampleIQ is the engine that drives Synergistix sampling solutions, helping our dedicated compliance and customer service specialists dive deeper into your engagement to remove manual work for your sales representatives. Leverage our system’s reporting and tools to pull key analytics and industry data, and consult with our twenty-five years of expertise to transform this information into actionable insights and intelligence.

Our smart sampling solutions were systematically engineered for compliance and commercial success in the life sciences industry. Schedule a demo with Synergistix to learn more.

References

1. Mastering the Sample Management Ecosystem, Pharma Manufacturing

When you think about it, a contradiction plagues your company and the pharmaceutical industry.

Your mission is to serve patients by developing and distributing drugs that combat and manage disease states and help extend and prolong life. Helping patients access these efficacious new drugs as quickly and safely as possible is a priority.

That’s exactly why the pharmaceutical industry is highly regulated. It must be.  Medicines and treatments can have an enormous effect on the lives of patients, and drugs in the wrong hands constitute a risk that public health policy must safeguard.

What If the FDA Walks Through Your Door?

Indeed, the stakes are high, so much so that the ramifications of not complying with regulatory affairs in pharma can be serious. They can lead to significant financial judgments, legal and criminal consequences, and reputational risk as well.

So here you are, challenged to innovate. Yet all the while you must monitor risk because the risk of non-compliance stands side-by-side with the compliance demanded by governing bodies and regulatory agencies.

The only way to operate, then, is with a thorough understanding of the laws and regulatory requirements that govern pharma and the ever-changing regulation and how it applies to your company. You must expect that regulatory scrutiny occurs across all your operations, including sales and marketing, drug price reporting, patient privacy, clinical operations, and manufacturing—and to the extent that business operations, financial services impact those policies, rigorous scrutiny must take place there as well.

Compliance on Steroids and Enterprise-wide

You must prioritize compliance at an enterprise level. Rather than settling for siloed views of regulatory issues in which your individual teams are responsible for ensuring compliance, you must build an enterprise-level view of what’s happening with regulatory issues. There’s an amazing machinery behind the scenes and much detail in that level of oversight and documentation, even more so if your company is large or global. That puts compliance in a priority ranking as a sustainable process—one that provides value and ROI.

The good news is that technology has become a huge resource for mitigating risk and decreasing opportunity for error. And the use of big data in pharma has opened up a world of possibility across your organization from research and development to marketing.

In pharma sales and marketing alone, areas in which PDMA, DEA, 21 CFR Part 11 require physician credentialing and validation, and proof of order and receipt, technology portals have enabled DTP drug sample delivery by generating processes for order and receipt, AOR or AOC acknowledgement.

So Much to Manage

Here are just some areas that need compliance oversight.

• Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) – Requires an annual audit to provide proof of accurate and secured financial reporting and compliance for the preceding 90 days.
• Affordable Care Act (ACA) – Requires drug-sample reporting to monitor quantities of drug samples requested
• CRO’s – CRO contracts and execution require monitoring
• Terminal Distributor of Dangerous Drugs (TDDD) – Ohio requires entitiesthat include hospitals, pharmacies, EMS organizations, laboratories, nursing homes, and prescriber practices to show TDDD licensure allowing them to purchase, possess, and distribute dangerous drugs at a specific location
• Deviations – Deviations occur when for whatever reason a procedure wasn’t followed…requirements include identifying what it was, why it was, and establishing the fix and preventive, and doing so in 5 and 30 days respectively
• Supply Chain Issues – COVID’s impact on UPS, FEDEX, and the P.O. have caused drug samples to go astray. Digital systems send up red flags for lost shipments to prevent the risk of drugs being sold on the black market

Synergistix: Providing the Depth of Compliance Rigor You Need

It takes vigilance across the enterprise and an enterprise-wide data flow system to enhance the compliance of day-to-day business activities. Digitized, data flow across the organization integrates all functions and departments into a single system to streamline information, synchronize reporting, and provide automation across the entire organization. Technology enables real-time business information to flow through many different business processes and ensure you say what you do, do what you say, and monitor the business and enforce your business rules and processes.

That’s why we’re here and how we can help. We were built as a company to enable and ensure and level up compliance through technology. We’ve been in the business for 25 years and have never encountered issues with the FDA. In fact, our company was founded and continues to employ not only expert technologists but also professionals who know and understand the ins-and-outs of pharmaceutical industry compliance requirements. Plus, we have a 24/7, stateside call center to answer your questions and address difficulties.

We Got This

We respect the fact that your company does things a little differently than other companies. We introduce our basic system, which is easily configurable with your system, or immediately enhances your processes if they are manual. We can uncover all the gaps that put you at risk and provide the oversight to ensure you mitigate risk by customizing your system to operate more efficiently and safely.

Imagine if you could focus on innovation and pair it easily with your compliance processes. Imagine if you didn’t have to worry about regulation because we were taking the need to worry out of your operations. Imagine if risk mitigation became seamlessly integrated with your day-to-day operations.

Imagine if you could say Synergistix has your back.

Your work is not just about growing your pharmaceutical business and not about making HCP’s look good to patients.

At the end of the day, it’s patients and the greater good you’re serving and protecting by your rigorous compliance.

Call us and ensure you’re providing patients with the medications and treatments that will help them manage diseases and conditions, make their world better, and prolong their lives.

Synergistix, Inc. is pleased to announce that for the seventh consecutive year, it was among the top ten 2022 award recipients of a Top Workplaces honor from The Sun Sentinel. Winners were chosen based on employee feedback.

The anonymous survey, gathered through a third-party survey administered by employee engagement technology partner, Energage, LLC., uniquely measures 15 culture drivers critical to the success of any organization. These include alignment, execution, and connection, just to name a few.

Synergistix fills those requirements and more. The company is known for its family culture, its caring top-down management, its amazingly intelligent, engaged workforce, and cohesive teams. These principles go hand-in-hand with the company’s core values of Quality, Innovation, Partnership, and Respect. They also carry through to the customer experience Synergistix provides to its life science clients by enabling them to build strong customer relationships and highly effective sales teams.

“We’re so pleased to be honored by this award from The Sun Sentinel,” said Don Schenker, Synergistix President and CEO. “Since our founding in 1997, we have always been focused on creating a strong corporate culture. Having The Sun Sentinel formalize the impact of our efforts with this recognition year after year is truly meaningful.”

Synergistix has been committed to fostering a corporate culture in which team members and managers understand one another’s professional and personal goals and work together to achieve them. “This maintains a company focus on people, and helps to retain staff and attract top talent,” Schenker said.

There are many employee and family-oriented programs such as its annual employee fun day, holiday party, summer family picnic and monthly events like softball games, happy hours, pot-luck luncheons, and bagel Friday’s, and Bring Your Children to Work Day, said Juanita Infante, Manager, Human Resources.

“What’s more, Synergistix invites employees who live and work remotely throughout the country to its corporate office three times a year. Meeting in person helps them get to know each other, build relationships, and feel a part. It’s our leaders and our people who are the heart of our company,” Infante said.

“I share these examples and the stories of the acts of kindness of Don and our senior leaders and am inevitably greeted with a ‘That’s amazing,’ or ‘Oh my gosh,’” Infante said.

She added that again and again, we see that candidates who appreciate the deep-rooted family and people-first values the company stands for align well with our culture. As with our long-term employees, these recruits immediately show how much they enjoy coming to work every day and being part of the Synergistix team.

Schenker said that these awards come naturally to Synergistix. “I believe our team members would cite one simple reason: ‘We get it’,” said Schenker. “We recognize that our staff has a life outside of Synergistix and to be successful at work and at home, it’s important to cultivate an optimal balance.” 

Eric Rubino, Energage CEO, agreed. “The employee experience needs to be on the mission critical list. Culture drives performance.”

Without data management, your company is pretty much stuck in the weeds…in everything from your supply chain to operations, from finance through contracting, sales and sample management, and the ever-present compliance and validation mandate.

Medicines and raw materials are being sourced throughout the world, and a drug’s distribution from manufacturer to physician involves many trading partners before the drug even gets to the patient.

And as stakeholder numbers increase so do their responsibilities. All teams must have fast and easy access to the same set of numbers to meet the needs of an at-a-glance culture. At the same time, teams must have detailed data at their fingertips that align with their area of responsibility and allow for deeper dives as needs dictate.

For example, Sales Ops must evaluate initiatives versus results and incorporate data for users beyond traditional Sales Management and Managed Markets to include a universe of promotional data along with sales activity.

Trade Group requires supply chain product movement data, including inventory and returns.

Contracting/Finance must monitor GPO activity and 340B sales activity to keep on top of appropriate negotiated rates

And as Specialty Pharmacy takes hold, you must capture SP/SPP data and incorporate rich insights from hub service providers to provide better care for patients.

Efficiency Key. Technology Non-stop

There are no two ways about it. Efficiency is the consistent key to having a competitive edge in the
marketplace.

The good news is that there’s no end to technology evolution.

Cloud-based computing has matured, reducing the need for extensive IT network investment. RFID tagging provides precise location of products and stands to revolutionize supply chain management.

And business intelligence dashboarding software quickly delivers an endless stream of impressive data visualizations and analytics for real-time monitoring and a manufacturing process that allows for continuous adjustment as data is collected.

To be sure, we’ve come a long way from the time digital first took hold in pharma…back when CRM technology transformed the industry and displaced paper-based call reports and IT computing became more powerful. The latest surge of technology advances provides you with the important tools you need to operate efficiently in the highly regulated pharma environment with the capability and competency to make massive amounts of data customizable for individual audiences—and the fuel to drive tactical and strategic directives.

The World of Data Exploding

Data is at the heart of all of this, and the explosion is incredible.

But incredible is only incredible if you harness these advancements. And you must. They serve as the information system that not only works today but is also adaptable and ahead of continuous change.

To achieve operational efficiency and the delivery of a superior customer experience, we
recommend these best practices:

1. Establish a Vendor-Neutral Data Platform – Adapt your information system to mix-and-match data sources from competing companies. There is no best-of-breed data to manage all your business needs.
2. Invest in Customer Master Data Management – If you can invest in just one thing, make this it. You cannot have high-value and 360-degree insights without a strong customer master system, impactful standardized reporting, and ongoing support processes. Your customer profiles are critical assets. Keep them proprietary.
3. Standardize Industry ID’s for Seamless Integration – Require all data sources to include as many industry-standard ID’s as possible and supply 3 rd party vendors such as speaker bureaus or marketing firms with files from your own MDM, so that all results come back with the required linkages, making integration a non-event.
4. Leverage Electronic Data Interchange Data to Track Your Product Movement – EDI provides secure commerce data between links of the supply chain, providing a clear picture of product movement. Even if your product is sold retail, having product movement data has numerous benefits like keeping Sales and Finance on the same page to validate the accuracy of the projections for your product.
5. Keep the Field involved. You need customer buy-in, so do not build systems in a vacuum. Form a joint team of top analytics talent and use best analytics practices in both the home office and the field. Some of the most progressive analytics are being performed at a local level, making field involvement crucial.
6. Create Your Own, Common-Sense Analytics for Scoring Customer Value – Create a common language to ensure that all stakeholders are familiar with the same reference points (e.g., prescribing volume, decile, rank in territory, prescribing patterns, specialty, whether they are aligned to a high-volume group practice, etc.)
7. Eliminate Data Overload – Bombarding the user community, especially the field force, with data can backfire. Give your people and departments what they need to run their business and perform relevant analyses.
   Tools and Knowledge to Develop Meaningful Insights
   The list is robust and a lot for you to manage on your own—which is when and where Synergistix is designed to serve you. We’re here to help you take advantage of the growth opportunities afforded by the tech evolution and data explosion. We have knowledge and expertise spanning more than 30 years’ experience in the full pharma data spectrum: syndicated data, promotion, client, supply chain, and specialty pharmacy.
   We offer customizable reporting for robust Rx data analyses from market to prescriber level as
   well as precise supply chain tracking from class of trade to customer-level:
   Reporting and Analytics With InView – customer, interactive dashboards, online 24/7
   High Performance Data Marts –
   o SQL – a one-stop shop, housing all syndicated, non-syndicated and client data
   with advanced integration routines and value-add metrics to deliver high-quality
   feeds to reporting systems and CRMs
   o DART – the fastest ad-hoc query technology on the market; results delivery in
   seconds with built-in analytics

Master Data Management – A full-service client repository of customer data that allows companies to distill, customize, and reconcile customer information from multiple sources

Harnessing the ongoing developments in tech and data is a must for your success. Contact us to learn more – with Synergistix at your side, take your organization to new heights.

2020 was a rough year for pharma.

When in-person promotion efforts were interrupted by the pandemic, the primary source of pharma company promotion stopped abruptly. Sales reps were pulled from the field and the distribution of samples to HCP pharma clients came to a sudden halt.

If that wasn’t enough, compliance challenges were accelerated by the FDA’s drug
serialization initiative, and the Drug Supply Chain Security Act (DSCSA) loomed as
another significant regulatory obligation. Though launched in 2013, the 10-year phased
implementation designed to eliminate drug counterfeiting, theft, and illegal diversion
came with yearly compliance deadlines. The most complicated deadlines were still
ahead, and November 2023 was set as the target date for full enforcement

Essentially, there was a lot going on and pharma companies were tested and pressured to the
max. But as it turned out, what started as a sad story turned into a story of how a
company’s ability to be agile leads to survival—forward movement, actually—even
when things go awry.

A Story of Agility and Technology Solutions

More than anything, 2020 became the story of agility, as the industry demonstrated the
ability to be adaptive despite market changes and external factors that caused
uncertainty. Indeed, 2020 showed that when companies remain creative and innovate
consistently, they can deliver for their customers. In the case of pharma, reps were
forced to go digital. Multi-Channel Solutions, including E-Detailing and Virtual Support,
were implemented full scale. Sample initiatives, promotion, and brand awareness were
maintained, and providers were able to continue supporting patients, and, once again,
Synergistix played a lead role in serving its clients. Even better, sales reps’ digital-only
access to HCPs has produced long-term benefits

• Sales reps typically three-minute face-to-face meetings have now been increased to 19 minutes, according to a recent study
• Prescription drug samples can now be sent directly to HCPs through a Direct to Practitioner (DTP) channel via a delivery service which has expanded access locations, and covers white space and large territories
• HCPs are responding favorably; HCP email open rates have increased significantly, boosting communication between reps and physicians
• HCPs have easy access and real-time support on mobile; in addition to sampling, e-detailing, an integral component of the Multi-Channel approach also includes a combination of varied and specialized content that is valuable in advancing brand recognition and helps physicians better support their patients.

What’s more, enhanced Multi-Channel Solutions efficiently and effectively manage
compliance-related components involved in Sample Accountability and Sample
Management programs. These include:

• Cross Channel Business Rules
• Frequency Limitations
• Specialty Inclusion/Exclusion
• Professional Designation Exclusion
• Allocation Management
• Strategic Sample Usage
• Adapt & Customized by Region, District, and Territory
• Aggregated Control of Sample Usage

At the same time, these programs best helped pharma companies track HCP activity,
enabling them to identify HCP interests and efficiently and effectively fulfill HCP needs.

Synergistix, with its Enhanced Multi-Channel promotion 3-pronged architecture,
has been instrumental in helping its clients lead the charge in their Sample
Accountability and Sample Management efforts.

• Our HCP Sample Ordering Portal enables reps and/or physicians to trigger sample orders
• Our SampleIQ evaluates orders and validates sample requests, using SIQ quality standards
• Our 3PL ensures fulfillment, logging inventory frequency, initiating shipping, and capturing data for our HCP knowledge universe

Everybody Wins

Restrictions imposed during the height of the pandemic are loosening. And the industry
continues to inch toward its DSCSA end date. There are no crystal balls to predict
whether digital will continue to be the only touchpoint between reps and their HCP
clients. But the scorecard to date shows the benefits of Multi-Channel solutions
outweigh those of in-person channels. In addition to protracted timeframes for rep-HCP
interaction, digital benefits include lower cost, reduced risk, fraud mitigation, increased
rep productivity and value-based outcomes, and environmental friendliness because of
the reduction/elimination of paper.

Just as Synergistix was challenged to find quality solutions in 2020, it will continue to deepen
its understanding of what pharma and HCPs needs. We will continue to work on what we’ve
always done: innovate always to improve our software, technology solutions, and
Sample Management and Sample Accountability services.

And we will continue to stay nimble and agile so that in good times and in bad, we are
able to best serve you in support of your HCP clients.

Call us to be your partner in your sample management initiatives or for more information on our solutions.