Robert Blank
Associate Director
Expertise:
Robert Blank is a managing consultant at EVERSANA, working extensively in revenue management software solutions for the pharmaceutical and medical device industries. His expertise includes Medicaid and Managed Care rebates, chargebacks, and membership management. He has developed custom client solutions around value based contracting, formulary validation, discount reallocation, and the 340B Drug Pricing Program. In his speaking engagements and published articles, Robert focuses on outlining industry trends and the impacts of legislation upon commercial operations.
Articles by Robert Blank
Linking Channel Distribution & 3PL to Non-Traditional Commercialization Touchpoints
To be competitive, maximize products and deliver exceptional customer service, trade and channel strategies must go beyond logistics. This presentation outlines how manufacturers need to connect the dots between customer type, whether they are specialty distributors, specialty pharmacies, market access, or revenue management, to improve strategic contracting decisions to impact ROI and GTN. Leveraging the […]
Forecasting in the Age of Value-Based Agreements
The pharmaceutical industry faces a host of increasingly complex challenges and critical decisions when attempting to manage and predict their products’ plausible revenue patterns. The mishandling of revenue forecasting and evaluation can result in substantial financial liabilities, which has become more of an issue for manufacturers as products, disease states and additional factors that previously […]
Aligning Net Pricing with Patient Outcomes – Removing Barriers to Value-Based Contracting
While value-based contracting has long been heralded as a way to ensure the cost of life-changing and life-saving medicines are aligned with patient outcomes, the complexity in their implementation has limited adoption to just a few isolated examples. By confronting these obstacles directly with an integrated approach to commercialization, the mechanics of value measurement can be […]
Gross-To-Net: Challenges and Best Practices
The application of clinical pathways and their enforcement through quality metric benchmark setting and appropriate use criteria is needed to guard against perverse financial incentives that encourage overutilization and underutilization. Moving forward, the more diligent payers and integrated delivery networks can be in evaluating and incorporating utilization criteria when establishing clinical pathways, the better off […]
CMS Proposed Medicaid Rule: Best Price Impacts of Value-Based Purchasing, Co-Pay Assistance Programs, and More
On June 17, 2020, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) published a proposed rule outlining nine specific changes to Medicaid regulations. Five of these directly affect manufacturers through changes in administration of the Medicaid Drug Rebate Program (MDRP): Value-based Purchasing Arrangements Line Extensions Patient Assistance Programs MDRP Definition Clarifications Authorized Generics Download EVERSANA’s […]
Function Over Fashion: Implementing Value-Based Contracts Successfully
Public outcry over drug pricing, increased government scrutiny, and proposed exceptions to government pricing rules propelled the healthcare industry to move from volume to value-based contracting models. Known alternatively as innovative outcomes or risk-based agreements, value-based contracts are performance contingent structures that aim to reinforce positive results, rather than just securing access and offering lower […]
Unlocking the Potential of Revenue Management Data – Webinar
Revenue management systems hold valuable data with tremendous potential to provide business insights. Unfortunately, the power of this data is often locked behind technology barriers and reporting roadblocks such as: Data and analytics sourced from multiple platforms Transactional data sets varying across lines of business Differing objectives across departments In this webinar, EVERSANA’s Managing Consultant, […]
Evolving Processes to Manage Value-Based Contracts
For the past several years, the pharmaceutical industry has focused on exploring and establishing value-based contracts (VBCs) between manufacturers and their customers. In these arrangements, payments are predicated upon measurements of patient welfare, rather than formulary access, purchase volumes or market share. Yet, despite the appeal of these arrangements, many manufacturers have been reticent to […]
More Data, More Problems, More Potential
As the healthcare industry shifts from volume-based care to a value-based reimbursement structure, data analytics will be critical in shaping the future of the pharmaceutical industry. More so than perhaps any recent industry trend, value base contracting is positioned at a unique intersection between various disciplines in the pharmaceutical industry. Clinical data informs market research, […]
Challenges and Best Practices in Managing Value Based Contracts
Manufacturers face a variety of hurdles when negotiating value based contracts: from data access and standardization, deal structure variation, payment variability and scheduling, to changing laws and regulations. And, as the industry shifts to value-driven healthcare, the demand for innovative product commercialization and pricing models grows. In this webinar EVERSANA experts Robert Blank and Mike […]
Gross-to-Net Improvement Through Holistic Revenue Enhancement
Consistent price increases have long been a staple of commercial strategy for pharmaceutical manufacturers. From this uplift in topline revenue, more sizable discounts can be provided to industry middlemen, like pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs), in order to secure more favorable formulary positioning. Rather than continue forward with traditional market access strategies, manufacturers should consider revenue […]
340B Drug Pricing: Challenges and Best Practices
Enacted in 1992, the 340B Drug Pricing Program was intended to stretch scarce federal resources and services to more eligible patients. Despite achieving this goal in many respects, it has also become notoriously difficult to manage for the more than 600 pharmaceutical companies enrolled. Data validity, crossover between lines of business, and conflicting regulations […]
Streamline Chargeback and Channel Operations
Robert Blank, Managing Consultant at EVERSANA, moderated a panel with industry experts from Sanofi, Zydus, and UCB at CBI’s 15th Annual Commercial Contract and Chargeback Excellence. The topic: “Process Improvement in Contract Administration and Management — Streamlining Chargeback Operations, GPO Rosters and Channel Operations.” If you missed this presentation, download Robert’s white paper on the […]
Membership Management Challenges and Best Practices
In the pharmaceutical industry, access to pricing is primarily driven by membership.Institutions like hospitals, clinics, and pharmacies sign up as members of a Group Purchasing Organization (GPO) to be eligible to purchase products at a discounted rate. In turn, the GPO leverages its collective purchasing power with the pharmaceutical manufacturers to secure a lower price […]
Pharmaceutical Contracting from Volume to Value
Driven by skyrocketing costs, market forces are hastening the shift in the healthcare industry from volume based care (fee for service) to a value based reimbursement structure (fee for value). While the inertia of entrenched policies, regulations, organization structures, and systems have held back the tide, industry analysts agree that the tipping point is being […]
Medicaid Drug Classification: Civil Monetary Penalties
On April 18, 2019, the “Medicaid Services Investment and Accountability Act of 2019” was signed into law, bringing with it a significant change to the oversight and management of the Medicaid Drug Rebate Program (MDRP). Effective immediately, this law enables the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to impose civil monetary penalties on any […]
Medicare & Medicaid: A Rollback on Rebates
In January 2019, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) put forth a proposed rule to repeal the safe harbor status for Medicare and Medicaid drug rebates under the Anti-Kickback statute. This idea was first conveyed in the American Patients First initiative, which the Trump administration put forth in May 2018. Intended to address […]
Medicare Part D: Closing the Coverage Gap
Signed into law on February 9, 2018, the Bipartisan Budget Act (BBA) of 2018 entails significant adjustments to consumer spending under the Medicare Part D prescription drug program. Beginning in 2019, the period of out-of-pocket expenses in Medicare, known colloquially as the coverage gap or donut hole, will be fully covered for beneficiaries. By requiring […]