Digital technologies, including generative AI, are transforming how organizations engage patients from research and development through commercialization. GenAI is set to become a workforce partner for 90% of organizations globally in 2025. By integrating these tools thoughtfully, companies can accelerate drug discovery, optimize clinical trials, enhance patient care, and improve access to therapies.
- Identify current barriers to fully utilizing generative AI in patient engagement
- Explore how digital methods can enhance patient access, support, and affordability
- Examine the role of technology in accelerating drug development, clinical trials, and commercialization
Advocacy thrives when it is embraced across the organization and not just within a single department. Yet legal, commercial, medical, and clinical development teams can sometimes be hesitant to engage, creating barriers to patient-centered progress. How can you get buy in from your senor leaders and embed advocacy strategies across all functions?
- Leverage patient insights to tailor market strategies that prioritize individual needs and outcomes
- Optimize the patient voice and personalize content to engage patients effectively and build trust
- Examine successful case studies of patient centric initiatives and key challenges to avoid
Powerful case studies can demonstrate how to redefine partnerships and put patients at the center of everything—from strategy to storytelling. Drawing on film, podcast, and experiential campaigns, this session will demonstrate how authentic patient voices can shape culture, guide decision-making, and drive measurable impact across advocacy, education, and access. How can lived experience evolve from inspiration to infrastructure, turning patient stories into meaningful community impact and enduring organizational transformation?
- Explore a collaborative approach to embedding patient voices in strategy, storytelling, and culture.
- Understand how narrative-driven engagement builds empathy, alignment, and measurable impact.
- Gain practical insights for sustaining patient partnership and purpose across your organization.
Amid transformations, reorganizations, and staffing cutbacks, maintaining patient advocacy as a strategic priority is a critical challenge. What approaches are companies using to ensure patient advocacy stays resourced and prioritized during organizational restructuring, pipeline setbacks, or shifts in focus?
- Explore methods to support advocacy roles, including partnerships with CROs or agencies
- Identify financial models that sustain patient advocacy during organizational change
- Evaluate whether decentralized, outsourced, or insourced approaches best support advocacy initiatives
The regulatory landscape is evolving rapidly and staying ahead of legal and policy changes is critical for organizations in life sciences. This panel brings together FDA experts to discuss the most recent updates, share practical guidance, and provide clarity on how these changes may impact your programs and patient engagement strategies.
The role of patient advocacy has evolved significantly in recent years, expanding the ways advocates influence research, access, and engagement. Gaining perspectives from several Chief patient officers, your team will learn how the role continues to evolve, how to address barriers to patient access, how to leverage technology to enhance patient engagement, and much more!
- Highlight the importance of incorporating patient perspectives throughout the trial process
- Discuss current challenges and trends that are happening today
- Gain insights into how different organizations address advocacy challenges and implement innovative solutions
Empowering patient advocacy leaders and their communities to co-create solutions and influence decision-making is key to building a robust advocacy platform. Overcoming internal barriers allows patients to participate strategically, ensuring their voices shape meaningful outcomes. How is your company empowering patient advocacy leaders and their communities to directly co-create solutions, influence decision-making, and even participate in governance structures at a truly strategic level within your organization?
- Identify the biggest internal barriers to deep patient co-creation
- Explore strategies to overcome these barriers and enable meaningful partnerships
- Examine methods to integrate patient advocacy leaders into governance and decision-making processes
- Understand the core elements of the FDA's Plausible Mechanism Pathway
- Discuss stakeholder implications, from patient advocacy to payer acceptance and commercialization challenges.
- Explore strategies to apply this framework to advance rare disease therapies efficiently
The EMA has released a reflection paper on the use of patient experience data (PED) in drug development, outlining principles for integrating PED throughout the product lifecycle. With public comments now open, this guidance aims to support earlier diagnosis and improve patient care. Understanding these provisions provides insight into how patient experience data may influence practices globally, including in the U.S.
- Review the key principles outlined in the EMA reflection paper on patient experience data
- Discuss how these EU provisions may influence U.S. patient engagement and drug development practices
- Explore opportunities to integrate PED for earlier diagnosis and improved patient care
Patient centricity has become a strategic imperative for high-performing clinical study operations and subsequent product success - but are we truly hitting the mark? Enterprise-wide expectations bring growing pressure to understand and align with patient and community needs, and to demonstrate a measurable return on engagement. This session brings into focus where patient and public preferences and actual research experiences converge, and where they do not, to help leaders in this space evolve their strategies with evidence and accountability.
- Explore CISCRP's latest global patient and public survey data on research perceptions, preferences and experiences, including AI, DCT, and key factors influencing participation decision-making (12,000+ respondents; 4,000+ clinical study participants)
- Discover key impact metrics from CISCRP's community engagement and outreach programs on effectively improving awareness, engagement, recruitment, and representation
- Juxtapose these insights with current regulator and organizational expectations to highlight the growing challenge of meeting patient and public preferences
Understanding the needs of the patient today not only allows us to develop treatments for underserved patient populations, but it is now a part of how pharmaceutical companies determine growth areas, generate access to new medicine, and increase innovation. As patient expectations rise and healthcare systems demand clearer evidence of relevance and impact, biopharma leaders are being challenged to embed patient insights across the full product lifecycle.
- Go over where to position patient engagement in biopharma organizations
- Discuss how patient engagement is expanding beyond advocacy teams to influence R&D, Medical Affairs, Market Access, and Commercial decision-making
- Evaluate approaches to measuring ROI and demonstrating how patient insights improve development decisions
Artificial intelligence and digital health technologies are transforming healthcare, creating both opportunities and major challenges. What role should patient advocacy play in guiding responsible integration of AI and digital health technologies to ensure they align with real-world patient needs and lived experiences?
- Explore ethical considerations in AI adoption
- Assess the impact of technology on patient integrity, safety, and autonomy
- Review industry trends in AI shaping healthcare delivery
Patient advocacy plays a critical role in navigating crises, ensuring that patient communities are informed, supported, and heard. In a survey by Capterra, 72% of business leaders say that they would broaden the scope of their crisis communications plan and even more would increase practice in advance. How can advocacy teams collaborate with communications, legal, and cross-functional task forces to craft and deliver crisis messaging that is transparent, accurate, and sensitive to patient needs?
- Be aware of the role of patient advocacy in crisis management
- Learn how to develop and execute crisis communications plans that are transparent, timely, and patient-focused
Patient Advocacy Organizations (PAOs) are playing an increasingly influential role in shaping market access strategies across the entire product lifecycle. Leading companies such as Gilead Sciences—recognized by Science Magazine with a Breakthrough of the Year honor for its HIV innovation—have demonstrated the value of engaging PAOs early to ensure the patient voice informs development decisions. Meaningful collaboration with PAOs enables patient insights to be embedded into clinical trial design, patient support programs, and market entry strategies. How can organizations partner effectively with PAOs to better meet patient needs while navigating today's access realities?
- Addressing common challenges, including funding limitations, regulatory requirements, and compliance considerations
- Discuss market access strategies that clearly communicate the value of innovative treatments to patients
- Navigating affordability, reimbursement, and access pathways to ensure patients can obtain and sustain treatment
Cross Border Clinical Trial participation involves patients participating in medical research in a country different than their own. For patients, it means access to therapies they couldn't get at home. For sponsors and CROs, it's a chance to reach diverse populations and accelerate recruitment. Successfully supporting patients in these trials requires navigating logistical, regulatory, and advocacy challenges to ensure safe and compliant participation.
- Review vendors, company policies, and common challenges in cross-border trial support
- Determine when patient relocation is necessary versus visits to and from study sites
- Discuss any regulatory and legal hurdles involved
Women's health is often treated as a specialty issue, yet it is a universal patient journey across a lifetime. Use a composite patient story to show where women commonly get lost in the system—dismissed symptoms, delayed diagnosis, inconsistent care pathways, and uneven access to treatment. What can patient leaders in pharma and biotech influence across evidence generation, trial design, education, and access strategy? The goal is practical: shorten time to appropriate care and improve durable access.
- Identify common points where women's health care breaks down (symptom dismissal, delayed diagnosis, fragmented care, access barriers).
- Describe where patient insights can inform evidence generation, trial design, and education across the lifecycle.
- Outline practical partnership opportunities that can support access (clinicians, advocacy organizations, health systems, payers, and policy stakeholders).
- Go over the role of AI in disease diagnosis and patient engagement
- Explore current applications of AI in clinical trials
- Discuss common challenges and pitfalls associated with integrating AI into patient advocacy efforts
The 2025 Budget Reconciliation Law represents one of the most significant shifts in healthcare coverage in recent years with many cuts being made to Medicare and Medicaid. This bill will cause a 15% reduction in Medicaid spending over the next decade. With many patients already struggling to afford healthcare, how can we continue to advocate for patient access and affordability?
- Discuss how to advocate for bills and policies that support patient access to affordable treatment options
- Identify methods to enhance patient education and support programs
- Examine how technology can be leveraged to expand patient access and reduce barriers
While US teams often lead with patient advocacy and community engagement, global teams face different challenges in integrating patient perspectives across diverse portfolios and regulatory environments. Despite perceived differences, the core goals remain the same, ensuring that patient voices shape development and access worldwide. How can US and global teams better align and collaborate and what obstacles are in the way?
- Discover strategies for stronger alignment between US and global advocacy teams.
- Explore common challenges and practical solutions for integrating patient perspectives across regions.
In patient advocacy, leadership is built on trust, credibility, and the ability to influence change. How can you intentionally develop a leadership brand that amplifies your voice, strengthens partnerships with industry, policymakers, and providers? How can you position yourself as a leader in your company, and influence those around you to do the same?
- Learn how to balance the business and emotion of advocacy
- Understand strategies to advance your career as a Chief Patient Officer
- Explore approaches to influence organizational culture and elevate patient advocacy initiatives
Safeguarding patients, families, and their data is increasingly complex amid evolving policies and regulations. Compliance teams ensure adherence to rules designed to protect patients, while engagement teams work to connect with them meaningfully. Aligning legal and patient engagement functions enables faster collaboration and strengthens patient-centered initiatives.
- Examine the impact of technology on healthcare compliance
- Establish clear partnership definitions and shared language between teams
- Review ethical, legal, and regulatory requirements for patient contact and engagement
