BioNTech SE
What Role Does Digital Technology Play in Life Sciences?
Yvonne Ware
With patient-centricity becoming the crux of all life science organizations, the pace of digitization within the industry has augmented significantly.
Achieving a single view of the patient has been a critical challenge for the life sciences industry, considering the inherently siloed nature of organizations in the sector. Organizations have been swift to understand the demand to implement transformative technologies like AI, IoT, analytics, blockchain, and cloud platforms, in order to create a world of patient centricity and personalized value-based medicines.
Here are three ways digital technologies will shape each stage of the drug lifecycle.
Clinical trials
Digital technologies have started to make a transformational impact on the way pharmaceutical and other life sciences companies hire for and operate the clinical trials. The application of AI-driven analytics is honing the patient recruitment by crawling through patient records to identify suitable candidates.
These technologies are boosting retention and adherence by using individual-level targeted insights and trigger-based digital media in order to manage patient needs more proactively. Physicians can monitor and prompt to make sure that the treatment regimens are being followed.
AI technologies, coupled with IoT platforms, are facilitating the most significant change in the sector towards virtual trails.
Manufacturing and the supply chain
The life sciences industry is experiencing a period of rapid innovation. Even as Good Manufacturing Process (GMP) compliance stays the foremost concern, manufacturers are finding new and creative ways to generate value in highly regulated contexts.
With the industry moves towards personalized medicines, production should also shift from large bulk runs to more precise and targeted batches. An interoperable data platform will be needed to capture the data required to facilitate this transition to a made-to-order approach that allows for the production of many product variants.
Commercialization
The enterprise-wide shift to a focus on patients and more significant collaboration among all stakeholders is most keenly felt in commercialization. As patients become more empowered, the life sciences industry is beginning to serve them better not only through the medicines it produces but also via its services which smooths the road for access, from the diagnosis to therapy to reimbursement.
