During April and May, the Better Health Worldwide (BH-WW) team is usually on the road or planning for upcoming travel to share our research. We generally fill our calendar based on our presentations, meeting with existing customers and building relationships with new customers. This year has been different in so many ways.
So far this year, we’ve seen cancellations of too many meetings to list. The cancelled annual meetings of the Academy of Managed Care Pharmacy (AMCP) and the International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research (ISPOR) are two meetings where our research and market access programs are traditionally well received. Clinical meetings we had planned to attend normally provide forums for us to educate clinicians about our research and unique data. We managed to share some of this/our research in February and received a lot of positive feedback. We remain optimistic that upcoming presentations will take place and we have begun to plan for more virtual congresses and explore this temporary new reality.
Several clients have asked us, “If the meeting was cancelled, did the presentation really happen?” The truth is, we don’t know yet. Similar to a research hypothesis, we can guess, but we rarely know the results before the research is completed. Our clients often ask about the probability of a successful study or outcome. We work with our clients to identify and implement the path offering the best chance of success.
Meetings have been working to make their presentations virtually available—including hosting research posters on the society’s, or meeting’s, website. However, is this any different than posting a poster or presentation on a website? How do we promote the research and get the peer reviewed informal feedback that helps us understand the best way to communicate our findings?
We continue to focus on safety while we work with our customers to re-orient communications plans. The shift from live meetings to web-based programs and old fashioned phone calls is how we continue to move our work forward.
We hope the coming weeks bring progress in many areas, most importantly, in managing the COVID-19 pandemic. The BH-WW team has worked from home offices since the company started. Our information is managed remotely, allowing us to continue to move our research forward. Through the use of technologies for web-calls and other interactions, our biggest challenges have been in managing our environments as our families and customers change their daily routines.
As always, the Better Health Worldwide team is working with our customers and partners to help plan for the future. How can we help you?
The team at Better Health Worldwide wishes you, your family, and our countries Better Health