The importance of compliance in your KOL interactions


With the recent changes to regulations about interactions with external stakeholders, it can be hard to keep up to date. Eyeforpharma spoke to Julian Jenkins, Head of Global Medical Affairs at Ferring Pharmaceuticals about how to work compliantly under the changing regulatory environment.

Whilst some changes are well publicised, for instance the US Sunshine Act and the UK Bribery Act, Julian says "it may be more challenging to keep apace with every change in every country, with even significant differences seen with the member states of the EU."

It is important to take steps to ensure compliance; he recommends "check with the local Pharma medical/compliance staff to avoid unintentional compliance breeches. This will also help with calculating fair market value of payments to health care professionals, as for instance pay scales differ significantly between countries."

So, what is the importance of engaging with these KOLs? Julian believes the term KOL is now out of date "it may better to use the term "external clinical experts" to better understand the relationship." He believes that when exploring the unmet medical needs in a therapeutic area or developing a new treatment "Pharma needs external expertise to guide decision making… as it were the Henry Fords and Steve Jobs of the medical world!"

For more insight from Julian on this subject, as well as topics on how to build long-lasting value and engaging with "new" stakeholders, join us at our upcoming KOL and Stakeholder Engagement summit, 21-22 Feb, Berlin.

For more information please visit www.eyeforpharma.com/kol

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