Patient-Focused Network Integration in BioPharma

The biopharmaceutical industry as we know it today is going through a massive upheaval as a result of the uncertainty of healthcare reform and increasing regulatory pricing pressure. A wake-up call to all sectors of the healthcare value chain, Patient-Focused Network Integration in BioPharma: Strategic Imperatives for the Years Ahead explores patient-focused network integration as quite possibly the only way for organizational evolution to occur. The book discusses how to align enterprises with the patient at the center. It details the historical context of the biopharmaceutical value chain and the current set of challenges facing the industry, and then details the author’s unique and sustainable agenda for change.

The book traces the critical but often ignored relationships between hospitals, insurance companies, biopharma manufacturers, government regulators, and clinical scientists. For too long, these parties have been operating in a void, without recognizing the interconnectedness of their objectives, even though these objectives are often competing and misaligned. This book points out the gaps that exist and develops a set of recommendations regarding disease treatments, clinical development of new products, and collaboration between these players that can result in a sustainable solution to the healthcare mess.

Each chapter can be viewed as an independent essay, in that it deals with a specific dimension of the healthcare value chain. However, together they provide an integrated discussion on how to begin the task of creating an integrated value chain network for healthcare. The book begins with the patient, and then works its way back down the value chain, all the way to the drug development and clinical trials stage of the value chain. The common thread throughout the chapters is the emphasis on collaboration, strategic alignment, and a focus on delivering value to the end patient.

Very simply, all parties in the healthcare value chain network must align their strategic planning to derive innovation solutions. It is only through true collaboration and aligned thinking that the parties in the drug development, distribution, insurance payors, and hospital provider network can deal with the incredible complexity and massive challenges that face the industry. The book provides a compelling maturity model that enables readers to gauge the level of network integration their enterprise is at today, and where they need to move in the future.

Rob Handfield is the Bank of America University Distinguished Professor of Supply Chain Management at North Carolina State University and director of the Supply Chain Resource Cooperative (SCRC; http://scm.ncsu.edu). He earned his PhD in operations management from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a BSc in statistics from the University of British Columbia.
The SCRC is the first major industry–university partnership to include student projects in the MBA classroom in an integrative fashion, and has had seventeen major Fortune 500 companies participating as industry partners since 1999. Prior to this role, Handfield was an associate professor and research associate with the Global Procurement and Supply Chain Benchmarking Initiative at Michigan State University from 1992 through 1999, working closely with Professor Robert Monczka.
Handfield is the author of several books on supply chain management and healthcare, and has published many scholarly articles on the subject. He is considered a thought leader in the field of strategic sourcing, healthcare supply chains, supply market intelligence, and supplier relationship management. He has spoken on these subjects across the globe, including China, Azerbaijan, Turkey, Latin America, Europe, Korea, Japan, Canada, and other venues.