The Importance of Patient Choice

A patient's journey from their diagnosis to starting therapy can be long and often they are given limited choices. The patients didn't choose their diagnosis, the life changes that come with disease burden, or what their insurance company may cover. A sense of choice enables a patient to feel empowered in their treatment and recovery.

The diagnosis of a rare disease results in therapy; many of which are specialty therapies requiring an injectable, HCP administration, titration, or clinical observation. Simply providing patients with the package insert (PI) and instructions for use (IFU) doesn't ensure therapy starts (acceptance) and can often leave them feeling overwhelmed and alone during a critical time of life. Although knowing and trusting a provider can sometimes overcome these obstacles; there is still the potential barrier of limited HCP availability and difficulty in scheduling that results in delays for therapy initiation.

So how can a manufacturer help patients navigate these barriers and restore patient choice? Selecting a patient-centricpartner, like UBC, is the first step. UBC offers multiple options for starting and staying on therapy. Allowing the patient to choose their preferred channel of engagement, timing for engagement, and location for support ensures every patient receives customized care precisely how they want it when they need it the most.

UBC's robust clinical network offers a variety of critical services: product and disease state education, product administration (injection or infusion), self-administration education, phlebotomy services, and administration observation that patients can access in whatever setting they prefer:

• In-home Visits: providing care in the comfort of the patient's home
• Retail Pharmacy Visits: providing services in a familiar and convenient environment like the local pharmacy nestled in their favorite grocery store
• Telephonic Visits: when a simple phone call will do the trick our clinicians engage the patient to establish a cadence for phone support that works best for the patient's busy life
• Virtual Visits: leveraging technology to connect on-screen using common apps and smart device cameras our clinicians can see (and be seen) while facilitating care services

UBC has a clinician at the ready for all types of support for any environment. Our clinical network ensures there is a clinician within reasonable driving distance of 90% of the US population. Our digital technology ensures ease of scheduling, and the availability of our clinicians allows for optimized flexibility and provides the patient with choices in how they prefer to receive and accept care.

UBC's history of offering choices for care spans more than 25 years. Providing the patient with choice throughout their journey empowers them to take an active role in therapy initiation and persistence. Together we can help you ensure your patients have the support needed to be successful on life-changing medications.

To learn more about UBC's history and our purposeful adherence solutions, get in touch with us HERE.

ABOUT UBC: UBC designs purpose-built patient support programs to meet the needs of the patient type and indication. By focusing experienced team members on patient's needs, we can increase speed to therapy and improve the number of patients that start and stay on therapy.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Sarah Middleton is a Senior Program Manager of Operations for UBC. With over 25 years of operational experience, she helps biopharmaceutical companies design, implement, and scale in-home care solutions. Sarah brings deep knowledge to drive operations forward in a streamlined manner.

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