Diagnosis
The market for oncology drugs is growing even as reimbursement is squeezed.

Prescription
Moving from selling to educating physicians will build greater loyalty from your customers.

Global sales of oncology products are expected to grow at a compounded annual rate of 12% to 15% by 2012, reaching nearly $80 billion. This growth rate for cancer drugs is nearly double the projected overall growth rate for all pharmaceuticals (about 6.5% in 2007).

The numbers translate into an abundance of opportunities for pharmaceutical and biotech companies that market oncology medications. By extension, of course, this phenomenal market surge suggests that there are sure to be enhanced opportunities for the thousands of sales professionals who promote these products to oncologists, hematologists, and other healthcare providers.

But wait a second, promote is not the right word in the context of oncology product marketing. That's because oncology drugs require an entirely different type of selling than conventional oral medications. Then again, selling is not the correct word either.

This shift in language is prompted by the fact that oncology sales are rarely driven by traditional product messaging delivered by field sales. These messages typically include all the features, benefits and competitive advantages that you learn about in your training programs. However, if that is all you have to work with when interacting with an oncologist, your presentation is unlikely to last very long.

Instead, oncology product utilization is largely driven by two critical factors:

Clinical protocols. Cancer treatments have become so specific to indicated disease (breast, prostate, lung, colorectal, etc.), tumor type and size, disease staging, patient type and therapeutic combinations that no single product "advantage" message works.

Reimbursement. Reimbursement for a single cancer product can be so complex that it frustrates physicians, office managers, patients—and sales representatives, too. Some insurers cover a product, and some don't. Some reimburse for a product for certain indications, but not for others. Some reimburse if treatment is in line with a prescribed protocol, but if providers deviate from the protocol, the reimbursement check might never come in the mail. The permutations and combinations seem infinite when one considers the number of indications, patient types, monotherapies, combination therapies and insurance organizations.

So let's examine protocols and reimbursement before we look into suggestions on how sales representatives can best serve customers in this highly active market sector.

Treatment protocols

Treatment protocols, or clinical practice guidelines, are systematically developed statements that support practitioners and patients in their decisions about appropriate care for specific clinical circumstances. Protocols are not at all unique to cancer treatment. In fact, they are commonly used to help standardize care in a wide variety of common chronic diseases as well, including asthma, diabetes and hypertension.

The most widely used standards of care in oncology are the Clinical Practice Guidelines in Oncology, which are created, published and routinely updated by the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN; http://www.nccn.org/).

The basic format of an NCCN guideline is a clinical algorithm that defines recommendations across the entire disease continuum. All NCCN algorithms follow the same basic pathways (see Treatment pathways).