Patient-Centricity: The Importance Of Human Factors In The Pandemic Era

By Marcus Agunloye, Senior Human Factors Engineer & Industrial Designer, Oval Medical, and Asmita Khanolkar, Senior Director, Cambridge Pharma, SMC Technical Strategy & Commercialization

In this article, Marcus Agunloye, Senior Human Factors Engineer & Industrial Designer at Oval Medical, and Asmita Khanolkar, Senior Director, Cambridge Pharma, SMC Technical Strategy & Commercialization, discuss how patient-centricity is at the heart of drug delivery device design and innovation, and how the global pandemic has highlighted the importance of patient-centric development in this field.

The drug delivery device market is expected to grow tremendously, bringing novel technologies and therapies to life. The key factors driving this innovation peak include a trend towards moving care out of hospitals and into patients' homes, adoption of smart devices, predictive data analytics, targeted therapeutics and personalised medicine. Patient focus is a common theme in all these drivers. As we begin this decade, it is clear that patient-centricity is at the heart of all innovation and one of the most important considerations throughout the development process. However, there is a lot of work still to be done in this field to truly understand the concept, process and what exactly the success criteria are towards a patient-centric development. The pandemic has opened our eyes to the importance of human factors considerations even further.