It Feels Good to be Recognized!

On September 11, I attended the InformationWeek 500 awards event where our North America Pharmaceuticals IT organization was awarded a place on the list. (That is me with my colleague, Carl, at left.)  Now in its 24th year, the InformationWeek 500 designation is awarded to the nation's most innovative information technology organizations. During the event, we heard senior leaders from a range of companies describe how technology innovation is transforming and disrupting entire industries. This is certainly the case in healthcare.

In fact, the same consumer trends that have driven widespread use of mobile phones, tablets, and apps are also now fundamentally changing how patients and healthcare professionals access and use healthcare information. As an example, today 85% of physicians in the United States use a smart phone for professional purposes. The rate of mobile health adoption by consumers has also doubled over the last two years, with 26% of US consumers now using mobile phones for health related activities.  Electronic medical record use is also growing rapidly, with some estimates forecasting that 90% of physicians will be using them by 2019.

In response to some of these trends, at GSK we're transforming our approach to digital information. One of the key digital innovation projects that got InformationWeek's attention was a major effort to deploy more than 5,000 tablet devices equipped with new apps and mobile customer management tools across our entire US sales force. These new resources make it possible for our sales representatives to communicate key information about our products anywhere at any time, in a way that is much more in line with the new ways our customers work and gather information. We also use the same customer management tools within our call centers, so that customers can benefit from a similar experience regardless of how they choose to contact GSK.

Clearly this is just the beginning of our innovation journey, but the public recognition we received this week from the InformationWeek 500 is an encouraging sign that we are on the right path.