Practice Economics: An Unspoken Factor That Can Make or Break a Launch

Over lunch today with someone I’ve known for years -- a client who has spent three decades across various big pharma clinical and commercial roles -- our conversation turned to product launches and market research. In the middle of our discussion, he shared an observation that stuck with me: too often, the commercial teams responsible for new product launches underestimate the role that practice economics play in adoption.

It’s not a story we like to tell ourselves. We like to imagine that doctors always choose the best option purely based on safety, efficacy, and convenience. That's what they seem to tell us, explicitly, when we do marketing research and dangle a new TPP in front of them. But when you scratch beneath the surface, practice economics can drive adoption -- or stall it.

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The Unspoken Role of Practice Revenue

Imagine a new therapy that is more effective, better tolerated, and/or easier for patients to use. On paper, it should be a slam dunk. Indeed, it might feel like a slam dunk in marketing research because respondents are biased, for various reasons, to exhibit favorable reactions to something that is ostensibly clinically superior.

But if prescribing it means the medical practice loses revenue tied to an existing infused therapy, such as fees for administration or reimbursement advantages, the calculation changes. This is especially true if the practice has already invested heavily in infrastructure, like building out and staffing an infusion suite. In that situation, switching patients to a therapy that bypasses the infusion chair isn’t just a clinical choice, it can feel like walking away from a sunk investment and an ongoing revenue stream.

This doesn’t necessarily mean physicians are being “unethical.” It simply means they operate in a real-world context, balancing clinical care with the sustainability of their practice as a business. Inertia in adoption isn’t always habit -- it’s often dollars and cents.

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Why This Is Hard to See in Research

If you ask clinicians directly in a market research interview whether economics influence their decisions, you’ll almost never hear a straightforward “yes.” It’s uncomfortable territory. Few want to admit that contracts, discounts, or infusion fees play a role in their prescribing behaviors. Instead, these considerations are often redirected, framed as decisions handled by the practice manager, the billing office, or “someone else.” In reality, this deferral doesn’t eliminate the influence of economics; it just shifts where the influence shows up, making it harder to detect through traditional research approaches.

That’s why the onus falls on insights and analytics teams to look beyond what doctors say. We need to ask better questions, triangulate with other data, and sometimes talk to others in the office -- practice managers, billing specialists, nurses -- who have a closer eye on how revenue flows through a clinic. These non-HCP perspectives often reveal the practical frictions that keep a product from being adopted.

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The Impact on Forecasting and Planning

Overlooking economics can lead to surprises: forecasts that miss the mark, launches that underperform, and strategies that don’t land. This is especially true with infused products, where revenue considerations are more visible.

If a new therapy shifts care from an in-office infusion to at-home or subcutaneous self-administration, patients may love it, but the practice may see it as a hit to their bottom line. Understanding that reality before launch allows commercial teams to plan more effectively, whether through education, support programs, or reimbursement strategies.

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A Call for Candid Conversations

What my colleague and I agreed on is that it’s time we bring these discussions out of the shadows and/or figure out ways to surface these uncomfortable realities. Acknowledging economics doesn’t diminish the importance of science or patient outcomes. It simply makes our strategies more grounded in reality.

As insights and analytics professionals, we have a responsibility to uncover these hidden drivers. Because at the end of the day, if we want innovation to truly reach patients, we have to understand not just the what of adoption, but the why.

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Over to You

I’d love to hear from you:

• Have you seen situations where practice economics played a clear role, positive or negative, in adoption of a new product?
• What kinds of questions, techniques, or approaches have you found successful in marketing research to create space for respondents to acknowledge economics as a driver of value?

Let’s make this a conversation.

Final thought: The economics of practice are not a side note, they are often the hidden tailwind or headwind behind every launch. The better we get at surfacing this truth, the more effective we’ll be at preparing for the real-world market.