How to Engage KOLs and HCPs with Secondary Research: Backing Your Dialog with Evidence

Medical affairs teams and pharmaceutical organizations are constantly looking for ways to effectively connect with Key Opinion Leaders (KOLs) and Healthcare Professionals (HCPs). One critical approach is leveraging secondary research to ensure that every interaction is evidence-based, relevant, and impactful.

By integrating rich insights from full-text journal articles, conference proceedings, as well as country-specific economic analyses, teams can create precise and credible communication strategies that resonate with KOLs and HCPs. This blog post will explore how leveraging secondary research enhances engagement and how medical affairs teams can incorporate it into their workflows.

Secondary research involves synthesizing existing data points, such as peer-reviewed publications, conference proceedings, or market reports, to enhance decision-making and strategic execution. For KOL and HCP engagement, secondary research ensures:

• Credibility: Referencing reliable, existing data builds trust and positions your organization as an informed partner.
• Relevance: Tailoring communications to include data points known to resonate with KOLs and HCPs increases the impact of your messages.
• Efficiency: By analyzing existing resources, organizations can save significant time and effort compared to primary research while maintaining quality.

KOLs and HCPs play distinct yet interconnected roles within the healthcare ecosystem:

• KOLs are typically authors of influential research, leaders in clinical or academic settings, and speakers at major conferences. They drive innovation and shape therapeutic landscapes.
• HCPs rely on the findings disseminated by KOLs, journal articles, and conferences to inform their practice and deliver optimal care to patients.

Full-Text Journal Articles

Abstracts provide a snapshot, but full-text articles reveal the entirety of a study’s methodology, results, and implications. For instance:

• Detailed Insights: Subgroup analyses, statistical methodologies, and safety data are often buried in full-text journal articles, making them invaluable resources for addressing complex questions from KOLs.
• Contextual Relevance: Understanding the broader implications of a study through discussions and conclusions can help shape your organization's engagement materials, such as slide decks or white papers.

By utilizing research databases with advanced features like citation tracking and AI-aided summaries, Medical Affairs teams can extract the most relevant insights quickly and efficiently.

A great example for application: If a KOL authored a key oncology study, referencing their findings during a roundtable discussion demonstrates both preparation and respect for their expertise.

Conference Proceedings

Conferences are an essential venue for unveiling cutting-edge research, often before it appears in journals. Proceedings provide real-time access to evolving discussions, including:

• Pilot Studies and Emerging Data: Leveraging abstracts, posters, and symposium reports offers insights into innovations not yet widely published.
• Discussion Trends: Monitoring recurring themes and key topics helps identify current priorities among HCPs and KOLs.

Leveraging conference takeaways ensures your outreach is timely, allowing you to provide the latest data and actionable insights to your expert partners. How can you use it? Invite a KOL to a webinar and base your topics on their recent conference presentation to address trends they’ve highlighted.

Country-Specific Economic Reports

Scientific rigor alone is not enough when working with HCPs; understanding local healthcare environments and economic barriers is equally vital. Economic reports and country-specific health data provide:

• Regional Variations: Understanding how treatment accessibility and uptake differ across markets.
• Resource Allocation: Data on healthcare spending and policy shifts influencing clinical practice.

When these factors are incorporated into engagement, it signals a commitment to addressing real-world challenges alongside scientific discovery. 

Of course, the main challenge is accessing secondary research across disparate platforms and then organizing it and aggregating content into an easily searchable repository categorized by topics, authors, and source types. This is where subscription databases like Biotechnology Source and Medline Ultimate prove invaluable, centralizing access to thousands of full-text journals Medline, EMBASE and BIOSIS, along with conference proceedings. 

In addition, integrated tools such as AI-powered summary features and natural language processing (NLP) can be instrumental in identifying recurring terms, citation patterns, and meaningful connections within the data. 

Pairing a comprehensive biomedical database with a business research database such as Business Source Corporate Plus, can further enhance insights by providing access to country reports, market surveys, and other critical intelligence, enabling a more holistic approach to research and decision-making.

Engaging KOLs and HCPs through secondary research allows your organization to establish credibility, align with the latest developments, and precisely target needs. Whether it’s using full-text journal articles to craft compelling narratives, leveraging timely conference proceedings, or incorporating economic insights, each element brings you closer to meaningful and impactful relationships.

When every outreach is backed by deep, contextual knowledge, your organization becomes a trusted partner, not just a participant, in advancing healthcare.