At Real Endpoints, we know the importance of showing mothers respect – especially Mother Nature. It took a storm the magnitude of Sandy to disrupt “The Healthcare Disruptors”. But with a hurricane wrapped in a Nor’easter bearing down on the East Coast – and continued uncertainty about what the coming days may bring – the wisest course of action was to postpone the Real Endpoints Symposium until 2013. We had a committed audience attending – … Continue reading
Sloan-Kettering Fires A Shot at High-Priced Marginal Cancer Drugs
No. It’s such a little word, but that doesn’t make it any easier to say. And nowhere is that more obvious that when it comes to cancer care, as Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center physicians Bach, Saltz, and Wittes point out in their provocative NY Times op-ed, “In Cancer Care, Cost Matters”. “Our medical culture equates ‘new’ with ‘better’ so unequivocally,” the authors note. Yet that hasn’t stopped them from outlining so convincingly how the evidence … Continue reading
Clinical Utility: An Ever Higher Bar To Clear For Molecular Diagnostics
Before covering a pricey molecular diagnostic, payers want proof that the test in question is both efficacious and adds new therapeutic value. As Dr. Ira Klein, Chief of Staff to Aetna’s Chief Medical Officer, told Real Endpoints in this recent podcast “we have to understand that the test gives the member or doctor actionable information.” What Klein and execs at other payers want are data concretely linking a particular test to improved outcomes and health … Continue reading
Patient-Based Pricing: An Answer To The Soaring Cost of Innovation?
Roche’s investor day on Sept. 5 provided heartening news for breast cancer patients. Executives outlined an array of increasingly targeted therapeutic permutations to combat the tumor, building on its leadership with Herceptin. But payers will have come away worried. The slew of new drugs, combinations and conjugates points to rapidly-multiplying per-patient costs, as (likely) premium-priced individual treatments are teamed up. Roche seems to be aware of the tension. Even as it promoted more effective versions of existing … Continue reading
German Scoreboard: Payers 1, Pharma 1
AstraZeneca and other biopharmas wait with bated breath for the first drug price tags to emerge from Germany’s new early added-benefit assessment process. So who’s winning as this hastily-introduced system undergoes its final tweaks? For now, we think it’s 1-1, payers and pharma. But that score could soon change. Industry has lost out on reference pricing: if negotiations between sponsors and the sick funds association hit the wall (as several are expected to do, especially … Continue reading
Is France Creating Its Own NICE?
Sort of. It seems that the French are getting more comfortable with the idea of calling health-economics by its real name, and of carrying out explicit cost-effectiveness evaluations a la NICE in the UK. Equally worrying for pharma is that France — with its top-ranking pharma-per-capita spend — is also looking to its other neighbour, Germany, for ideas on how to further tighten entry hurdles for new pharmaceuticals. The new HTA acronym to note: CEESP, the Commission d’Evaluation … Continue reading
Medco Enters Europe: One Company’s Hurdle Is Another’s Opportunity
With falling prices and growing reimbursement hurdles, Europe is the last place most pharma want to be right now. One man’s hurdle is another’s opportunity, though. So it is for Medco, the US-based pharmacy benefit manager, which has recently launched a Europe-focused international operation, underpinned by various legacy collaborations including in Germany, the UK and the Netherlands. The idea: to apply its US expertise and experience in the European context, where different systems and different … Continue reading
The Healthcare Round-up: 2/7 -2/13
What’s better than a box of chocolates or a dozen fair trade, organic red roses? A #healthpolicyvalentine. It’s cheaper too. Wonks and journos quickly embraced the nerdy Twitter hash tag created last week by Health and Human Services staffer Emma Sandoe. Notable gems included: Let’s grow Medicare-eligible together I know I am being inpatient, but how about a private exchange? I want to put the oh! in your ACO. Roses are red, violets are blue. … Continue reading
Building The Greater Real Endpoints Community
You know that old saw “it takes a village”? Before you roll your eyes, consider this: the same underlying premise embodied by this oft-uttered phrase is what’s driving the new openness called “externalization” at drug and device makers. Simply put, in the past few years, product makers have realized that they don’t have a lock on innovation and need to find ways to access new ideas as they reshape their pipelines. So what are … Continue reading
A Biosimilar Deal Making Bonanza
Affordability matters to the branded drug industry just as much — if not more — than scientific innovation. Skeptical? Look no further than the trio of biosimilar deals in December 2011. On Dec. 6, Biogen Idec announced a $300m development and manufacturing joint venture with Korea’s Samsung. A couple of weeks later, Momenta, an expert in product characterization, signed a biosimilars development deal with Baxter that may include up to six products. But most significant in … Continue reading