Podcast: Pharmacohesion: What is it?

00:00:00:00 – 00:02:06:12
Matthew: Hi, my name is Matthew Dickinson. I’m the Managing Director of Dice Medical Communications. Today, I’m here with Sandra Laird and Rob Wilson to discuss a process we use in medical communications called Pharmacohesion. Welcome both. Do you want to introduce yourselves?
Rob: Sure. My name is Rob Wilson, and I’m Creative Director here at Dice.
Sandra: And I’m Sandra Laird, Director of Medical Education and market access at Dice.
Matthew: Great. So, where did Pharmacohesion come from? As a med comms agency, we noticed that we handle a wide range of deliverables for our clients.

00:02:06:12 – 00:03:17:20
Matthew: We realised we didn’t have a clear way to describe the various types of work we do for our clients. Rob, do you remember when we first sat down with clients early on, talking about what Dice actually does and how many different jobs we handled, but without grouping them?
Rob: I do. You always referred to it as an elevator pitch—what you’d say if you had a minute to impress someone. I’d often stumble over what to say. Creating that pitch really helped ground us.
Matthew: Sandra, you joined after we’d developed Pharmacohesion as a concept. What was your initial impression of the framework when we shared it?

00:03:17:22 – 00:04:26:22
Sandra: For me, in a med comms agency, it’s easy to assume we just focus on tactics. But Pharmacohesion defines the entire flow of a project. Without key insights, we don’t know why we’re developing something, and we might end up with a tactic that’s not strategically aligned.
Matthew: Exactly. Pharmacohesion is a four-step process that ensures cohesiveness throughout the material’s journey. It starts with generating insights related to the therapy or brand area. These insights drive strategic development, which leads to execution. The fourth step, measurement, will be discussed in more depth in a separate episode.

00:04:26:23 – 00:05:11:09
Matthew: The performance of the execution is critical, but what’s often overlooked is that measurement drives further insights. It’s a loop—it doesn’t just stop at measurement; it feeds back into the process. Rob or Sandra, can you think of examples where we’ve gone through this process—gathered insights, developed a strategy, executed, and then measured—and where that measurement has informed new insights or evolution?

00:05:11:09 – 00:06:27:01
Rob: Everything we do is grounded in those four stages, and having that structure is really valuable internally. While some projects are one-offs, many are recurring, and going through the full cycle is crucial when revisiting them the following year—especially for events. Ending with measurement and restarting the process the next year is key.
Matthew: Sandra, do you agree?
Sandra: Absolutely. Sometimes we focus on isolated tactics or execution, but even then, during the briefing, we’re trying to understand what strategy that piece supports. Whether we’re involved in the whole process or just ensuring the tactic aligns with the strategy, that thinking is essential.
Matthew: A good example—anonymised—is a medical education program now in its fifth year. The original insight was whether people wanted to get back together.

00:06:27:01 – 00:07:32:24
Matthew: The goal was to bring people together in a room again. The strategy was to kick off an in-person meeting, the first post-COVID event for a therapy community. We executed it successfully, though there were areas to improve. We measured success by attendance, engagement levels, and the performance of materials we provided, such as which topics resonated most.
Those measurements informed the next year’s insights and strategy. For example, we shifted from a remote model to a hybrid, and ultimately to a fully in-person setting. It’s a strong example of Pharmacohesion in action.
And to your earlier point about the elevator pitch, I think it not only helps our clients but also new team members understand how we work as a business.
00:07:32:24 – 00:08:31:20
Matthew: With so many new starters and our continued growth, it’s helpful to have the elevator pitch—literally on the wall over there. Pharmacohesion gives us a framework to explain how we help our clients launch, build, and continually grow their pharma brands. It’s a powerful tool.
I’d like to touch on the history behind the name. As an agency, we had the four elements—insights, strategy, execution, and measurement—but no overarching term to bring them together. Do you remember how we came up with the name Pharmacohesion and our tagline, “We create Pharmacohesion”?

00:08:31:22 – 00:09:46:00
Rob: We treated it like a branding project for a client. Pharma can be complex, so we wanted to simplify it and bring all the elements together. The word “cohesion” fit perfectly, and pairing it with “pharma” gave us Pharmacohesion.
Matthew: It also had a nice double meaning. James, our Associate Director at the time, pointed out the connection to terms like pharmacology and pharmacovigilance. It was a clever play on words. We’ve trademarked it, and it’s now our tagline: “We create Pharmacohesion.”
Rob: From a creative standpoint, I was surprised at how much we’ve come to live and breathe it internally. It started as a way to communicate with clients but has become a central part of how we operate as a team.

00:09:46:00 – 00:11:02:21
Rob: Pharmacohesion is essential for the day-to-day running of the business, especially with creative ideas. Each section—insight, strategy, execution, and measurement—guides decision-making.
Sandra: Creative briefs often start with an insight, which drives the creative process.
Matthew: Absolutely. Our creative briefing process always begins with the insight: “What’s the strategy we’re executing against? What are you asking us to do, and how will we measure success?” Every job we take on, whether it’s running an ad board or developing a full medical education program, follows this process. We ask: What’s the insight? What’s the strategy? How should it be executed? And how will success be measured? This framework has been instrumental in driving our clients’ businesses forward. We’ll explore this further in the measurement episode.We keep pushing clients to share more data about what works and what doesn’t.

00:11:02:22 – 00:11:45:17
Sandra: It’s crucial, but it’s also important to remember that data doesn’t equal insight. We need to uncover the insights hidden within the data.
Matthew: Right. There’s the classic question of what constitutes an insight. People often use the term “insight,” but not everything called an insight actually is one. From my perspective, Pharmacohesion has allowed us to truly live and breathe our role as a full-service agency. I’d love to hear your thoughts on that.

00:11:45:19 – 00:13:27:01
Matthew: Some clients come to us for ad boards, others for writing clinical papers, some for sales aid delivery, and others for the full omnichannel experience, including brand strategy development. Pharmacohesion has allowed us to clearly communicate that, while clients can come to us for a specific tactic, we also offer an end-to-end full-service capability. Many agencies claim to do this but don’t actually deliver. When you look at the number of jobs we execute under each pillar of Pharmacohesion, it’s impressive. We’re not just an execution agency, and that’s exciting. From my perspective, Pharmacohesion is a stamp that shows we are a full-service agency with the ability to handle any tactic and gather any insights.
Sandra: I agree. It’s not just about what we deliver to clients but how Pharmacohesion has become part of the organisation’s DNA. We live by it, use it, and refer to it regularly. Pharmacohesion is not just externally focused; it also drives us as a business.

00:13:27:02 – 00:14:40:03
Rob: Clients can approach us in two ways: with a clear tactic they want to execute or with a problem they need solved. Pharmacohesion helps us structure and solve that problem. It breaks it down into stages, offering both clients and us a clear solution.
Matthew: I completely agree. Pharmacohesion encourages us to brief the problem, not the solution. It’s important because the problem is what matters, and how we solve it will evolve. The insights we gather might change the execution plan, leading us to a better solution than we initially imagined.

00:14:40:09 – 00:16:04:20
Matthew: It could be as simple as clinicians not watching the videos we send them. In that case, creating another video would be the wrong solution. This is all part of Pharmacohesion.
From a business standpoint, Pharmacohesion is our process. But what we really stand for is helping realise the ambitions of the scientists behind the therapies we work on. We want to help transform the lives of people with unmet medical needs by assisting our clients in developing, launching, building, and evolving their therapies, ensuring their success. That’s the essence of Pharmacohesion. And that’s our elevator pitch to finish off this episode.
Rob: Can I just add one more thing? To me, Pharmacohesion is all about partnerships with our clients and patients.
Sandra: Also partnerships with our internal teams, including creative, accounts, and writers, all working together to deliver.

00:16:04:23 – 00:16:51:06
Matthew: Well, thank you, Rob. Thank you, Sandra. That was a really interesting discussion. It will be nice for me to dive deeper into each individual strand of Pharmacohesion, such as insights, strategy, execution, and measurement. But before we wrap up, any closing remarks about Pharmacohesion?
Sandra: For me, it drives the DNA of the organisation, and that’s what makes it different.
Rob: I agree. It’s integral to our day-to-day work. We know what we’re doing and what the plan is. It makes everything much simpler.
Matthew: It also helps bring clients along on the journey with us. Our long-standing relationships are a result of how we work together. Well, thank you both.