The period of profitability for any pharmaceutical product is bookended by the development cost and time-to-market on one side, and the loss of exclusivity on the other. Pharma (or any for-profit company for that matter) is looking for ways to maximize the relatively short profit window before loss of exclusivity by optimizing the development process (i.e. reduce development cost and time) and accelerating market penetration. Considering the complexity, risk, time and expense of the pharmaceutical development process, it’s extremely important to choose the right development partners.

The Calian Contract Research Organization (CRO) team offers customers the benefit of over 20 years of experience providing turnkey Phase 2 to 4 clinical development services that use state-of-the-art technologies and methodologies to improve efficiency, data quality and patient access. Electronic systems—such as EDC, CTMS, eTMF, ePRO, eCOA and eConsent—and methodologies—such as risk-based monitoring, adaptive CT, DCT, SMOs and patient support programs (PSP)—have evolved in response to the industry’s desire to get products to market more safely and efficiently so that people can get relief sooner. Once these pharmaceutical products come to market, the Calian PSP division accelerates market penetration with reimbursement services and a national network of more than 2,800 HCPs, supported by its proprietary workforce and workflow ERP software called Calian® Nexi™.

“Calian healthcare solutions are engineered to improve access to high-quality care. Our innovations increase efficiencies, deliver breakthroughs and enable new pathways to better outcomes on a global scale,” says Patricia Moore, Vice President of Clinical Operations, Calian Health. Moore is responsible for operational management and business leadership. She is dedicated to the successful and efficient execution of customers’ clinical trials.

Pharmaceutical Development and Patient Access

Calian has been a full-service CRO and clinical functional service provider (FSP) since 2001. The company has an impressive infrastructure tailored to maximizing quality, efficiency, and support, without sacrificing responsiveness or flexibility.

With the acquisition in 2020 of All phase Clinical Research Services Inc., a CRO, and Alio Health Services Inc., a patient support programs (PSP) company, Calian expanded its capabilities to serve the pharmaceutical and healthcare industries from pharmaceutical product development (clinical trials) to post-market patient support programs (patient access),thereby facilitating personalized care and better patient outcomes.

By using the team’s collective knowledge and experience, Calian help clients achieve success through the provision of dedicated, experienced and diligent staff. “Our CRO solutions include scientific and regulatory affairs, project management, clinical monitoring, data management, medical writing, medical monitoring, biostatistics, drug safety, quality assurance, and FSP outsourcing. We deliver passion, expertise and flexibility to accelerate the advancement of new treatments for patients,” says Moore.

Innovation and Partnership

In the highly regulated pharmaceutical development industry, the primary differentiators that Calian brings to the market are efficiency through leveraging state-of the-art technologies, relationships built on trust and accountability, access to more than 2,800 HCPs that can support DCT and PSPs, and 20-plus years of industry experience in multiple therapeutic areas. Pharma companies also leverage Calian for its clinical FSP outsourcing expertise, national & international reach, quick response time, impressive retention rates and competitive pricing. Subsidiaries of global pharma clients who include Calian as their in-country FSP resource provider consistently benefit from faster results.

Part of the Calian strategic objective is to align the pharmaceutical development resources that it has acquired and developed through innovation and diversification, to accelerate the development process so that clients can realize a larger benefit from the lifetime value of their products. “To our knowledge there are no other companies that offer both full-scale CRO and PSP services, and who leverage those systems and technologies to generate real world evidence to cost-effectively support clients’ objectives, says Moore. “This unique synergy enables our clients to move their specialty products into the market very quickly and with less friction. Pharma and biotech companies align well with our size and flexibility for fully outsourced projects (or a-la-carte needs).”

While explaining the value proposition of the company, Kevin Ford, Chief Executive Officer of Calian Group, recalls an instance when the team innovated to support a clinical trial that Calian had been working on since 2017. The trial required that subjects attend clinics for blood collection according to a strict schedule. In 2020 when the pandemic happened, the fact that subjects could no longer go to clinics put the trial in jeopardy. In less than a week Calian mobilized its international PSP-services nursing network to dispatch nurses to subjects’ homes to collect the requisite blood samples, and then have the samples sent to the lab for processing. The project continued without any delays or loss of data and continues to operate under this DCT approach today.

Providing Responsiveness and Value

Calian was formed in 1982 with headquarters in Ottawa, Canada. For four decades, the Calian core operating principle has been to provide professionalism, responsiveness and innovation to its valued customers in a diverse catalogue of industries: healthcare, communications, learning and security. Before long Calian had gained the reputation among its clients that you choose Calian when failure isn’t an option.

As CEO, Ford focuses on enabling the management team to execute the company’s four-pillar growth framework of customer retention, diversification, innovation and continuous improvement. This unrelenting focus has taken the company to the next level, with revenues exceeding the half-billion-dollar mark in 2021. It’s one milestone on the journey to becoming a billion-dollar, proudly Canadian company. Named CEO of the Year by the Ottawa Chamber of Commerce and Ottawa Business Journal in 2017 and EY Entrepreneur of the Year in 2019, Ford attributes his success to teamwork, integrity and commitment. These values, combined with his enthusiasm for Calian technology and talent and his passion for diversity and inclusion, help him to future-proof the business. Today, under the leadership of Ford, the company’s sole mission is to help the world communicate, innovate, learn, and lead safe and healthy lives— today and tomorrow.

In the long run, the team envisions leveraging the Calian network of 2,800+ HCPs for decentralized clinical trials using the efficiencies afforded by Nexi technology. As part of its expansion effort, the team will continue to expand its model of leveraging PSP data to support RWE research, in addition to leveraging Primacy Property Management and Primacy TV (tv advertising in waiting rooms) to increase clinical trial awareness and patient recruitment.

“We also plan to integrate Phase 1 and SMO services with our CRO and PSP services, all governed under a single QMS and digital system that will reduce friction and speed time to market. The plan also includes maximizing its cybersecurity posture by leveraging Calian IT and Cyber Solutions,” says Moore.