Why pharma packaging should be focused more on the patient
Eugene Canavan, medical design director at Design Partners, explains why pharmaceutical packaging should be created with the end user in mind.
In today’s world of increasingly complex medication kits, multi-tablet regimens and drug delivery devices, it can be difficult to stand out and differentiate your brand. Often, to patients and various healthcare professionals (doctors, nurses, pharmacists) one offering appears to be much the same as another.
Pharmaceutical packaging is primarily designed to achieve quality standards, meet regulations and to be delivered utilising a lean manufacturing process. Little consideration is given to the end user and their needs. As a result, many packaging formats tend to be austere and dull. Little in this offering promotes patient engagement or encourages adherence over time. In addition, not realising the role of packaging as a tool to enhance and promote a therapeutic alliance between the patent and healthcare professional is a missed opportunity.
The therapeutic alliance recognises that the healthcare professional is expert in the medical field, but that the patient is expert on their own illness and what it means to live with it 24/7. The quality of engagement between healthcare professional and patient is key. The therapeutic alliance is a mutually beneficial relationship between the healthcare professional and patient. It builds trust, patient engagement, and patient empowerment. This relationship which has quality patient and healthcare professional engagement at its core is shown to greatly effect beneficial change for the patient and achieve a positive therapeutic outcome.
In drug development programmes, the purpose of clinical trials are to establish the safety profile and clinical efficacy of the compound and how it is primarily delivered. This process does not focus on patient on boarding, the patient experience or how its effected over time. As a result, not enough consideration is given to the physical presentation of the drug packaging and the positive affect it can have on patient and health care professional engagement, and by extension the therapeutic alliance. With no strategy to consider enhancing quality of engagement and communication with the patient, usability barriers are often overlooked or at worst inadvertently designed in. Usage barriers lead to poorly engaged patients and product dissatisfaction, despite any clinical improvements.
In the transition to outcomes-based payments, governments, health plans and drug manufacturers are now looking to adjusted revenue reimbursement, based on how well the medication performs in a real-world population. This shift from volume to value is a major incentive to drug manufacturers to understand patient needs and promote positive patient engagements, in an effort to improve the treatment outcome.
There are significant areas for differentiating innovation in pharmaceutical packaging relating to the engagement of the healthcare professional and patient, while also considering the relationship or alliance that is required between both parties to optimise the outcome.
For innovation at the front end of packaging design, we need to consider the following:
Clearly identify and contextualise user needs and attitudes: While the primary user is generally the patient, this research must also encompass the pharmacist, prescribing physician, nurses and carers; often including parents, spouses and other family members. Understanding the needs of each respective user group is the key starting point of packaging innovation. While research methodologies such as surveys and questionnaires have value, first-hand voice of customer data gathered through methodologies such as ethnographic studies and contextual enquiry are immensely more powerful tools.
Map the patient journey and perform task analysis at each stage of treatment administration: Understanding the patient journey leads to valuable insight related to barriers to use and the intersection points with healthcare professionals. Gaining an understanding of what is complex in the eyes of the respective user is invaluable. This allows for simplification of each individual task. While also mitigating risk related to usability uncertainty, that may cause the patient to stop treatment or not start in the first instance. This task analysis should also include the initial personal interactions with carers, healthcare professionals and pharmacists.
Create desirability and empathy: Creating a quality, tactile and visually appealing aesthetic will appeal to the senses leading to greater levels of engagement. A simple communication hierarchy will result in less visual clutter and reduced cognitive load for the user. Packaging, which is delivered in a positive and empathetic manner, will have a more impactful out of box experience, emotionally bonds the patient and bringing a greater sense of value to their treatment.
Bring design language consistency across all packaging and support materials: Creating a consistent look, feel and messaging across all patient touch points is something that can be easily overlooked but can have significant consequences that disrupt patient continuity. This also supports the therapeutic alliance by bringing consistency of message at each engagement with healthcare providers. Ensuring continuity of branding and visual design is core to this process, but also at the component level. Variation in pill formats, injectors or kit components can be a source of doubt, efforts to bring consistency will be rewarded.
First impressions count: In our experience, winning the first engagement with the patient is critical to successful on-boarding and increases adherence to the treatment programme. While we can create consistency at the packaging level, efforts must also be made with healthcare professionals and prescribing pharmacists to ensure continuity of messaging and positive reinforcement.
Utilise Human Factors Engineering (HFE) methodologies and processes to de-risk usability: HFE is a process where the usability of the packaging solution can be systematically assessed, tested and refined. Early in the development process HFE formative usability testing is used to assess the merits of concepts and the insights from the testing is brought into the next stage of development. At a later point, usability validation in the form of summative usability testing is used confirm that the packaging is safe and optimised for use. Utilising HFE process will contribute to the regulatory approval and provide an effective risk management tool. These processes will also serve to provide strategic advantage and brand differentiation, while effectively containing costs.
As we progress on a journey to innovate in the world of pharmaceutical packaging and drug delivery, the essential quality and regulatory pillars will remain, as will the requirement for lean and value-based manufacturing processes. We also need to innovate our thinking and approach to include users and healthcare professionals as fundamental starting points of the packaging design and creation. This will allow us to deliver products that enhance patient engagement with healthcare, promoting a therapeutic alliance that will ultimately lead to better outcomes for patients and healthcare providers.