Advocacy Groups within Pharmaceutical Industry Serve as Valuable Resource for both Internal and External Stakeholders

CHAPEL HILL, N.C., Jan. 31, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- The pharmaceutical industry recognizes that patient advocacy groups serve as a critical information channel for patients. Thus the function within pharma companies that interacts with patient advocacy groups has risen in importance as organizations look for effective ways to better communicate with patients.

And in addition to working with external patient groups to educate consumers, the advocacy function within the pharmaceutical sector also works closely with internal groups such as government affairs and policy.

In these times of tight resources, pharmaceutical advocacy groups are challenged to effectively serve both internal and external customers. To determine best practices in advocacy operations, Best Practices, LLC conducted a research project to explore what are the appropriate activities, structure and staffing to ensure advocacy meets the needs of both internal and external partners.

Some of the benchmarks to surface regarding Advocacy structure, resourcing and responsibilities were:

• Assigning advocacy staff 100 percent to customer or unit they serve and centrally locating staff to nurture skills are the two most highly rated staffing approaches for serving internal customers.
• Almost half of research participants - 44 percent - said they interact daily with Government Affairs and External Communications.
• Organizations prefer to keep advocacy as an in-house function with outsourcing limited to 5-10 percent of advocacy FTEs.

The report, Advocacy Excellence: Optimizing Group Structure & Operations, contains an array of benchmarks regarding patient advocacy structure, resources and activities. The 61-page report contains 112 metrics and 33 narratives to help inform advocacy leaders attempting to align their structure, resources and activities with corporate goals and internal customers' needs.

Key Topics of this report include:

• Trends and Drivers of Sub-Group Structural Evolution
• Advocacy Group Models and Structures
• Advocacy Staffing Benchmarks
• Service Levels and Priorities
• Roles and Responsibilities
• Communicating the Value of Advocacy

Executives and managers involved in Advocacy can use this research to compare their structure, resources and responsibilities with those of leading organizations.

Download a complimentary report summary at: http://www3.best-in-class.com/rr1265.htm.

For more information on this study or other recent primary research studies, contact us at 919.403.0251 or at [email protected].

ABOUT BEST PRACTICES, LLC
Best Practices, LLC is a leading benchmarking, consulting and advisory services firm serving biopharmaceutical and medical device companies worldwide. Best Practices, LLC's clients include all the top 10 and 48 of the top 50 global healthcare companies. The firm conducts primary research and consulting using its comprehensive proprietary benchmarking tools and analysis. The operational insights, findings and analysis form the basis for our Benchmarking Reports, databases and advisory services to support executives in commercial and R&D operations.

SOURCE Best Practices, LLC