Considerations for Planning Effective and Appealing Advisory Boards and Other Small-Group Meetings with Health Care Providers: Importance of Participant Preferences

Abstract

Background

To optimize cost effectiveness, engagement, reach, inclusivity, insight quality and quantity, and participant satisfaction of pharmaceutical meetings such as advisory boards, the organizers have to carefully weigh the pros and cons of the available meeting formats (in-person, synchronous virtual, asynchronous, hybrid). While budgets and organizer preferences are typically key considerations, participants’ preferences are rarely factored into this decision. Hence, the objectives of this study were to gain a better understanding of participants’ preferences for meeting format, frequency, and updates.

Methods

Between September 1, 2022, and December 31, 2023, health care providers (HCPs) participating in asynchronous advisory board touchpoints on a proprietary virtual platform were asked to answer between 1–4 survey questions, selected at the pharmaceutical organizers’ discretion.

Results

A total of 443 HCPs answered the survey. Among respondents, 76.0% preferred meetings with a virtual component. Overall, the most popular meeting approach was a combination of synchronous and asynchronous virtual meetings over time (34.6%). The preference for hybrid meetings increased from 14.3 to 27.3% between 2022 and 2023. The preferred meeting frequency was 2–3 times a year (39.2%), followed by quarterly (33.2%). According to the respondents, the most important benefits of virtual over in-person meetings include: (i) superior convenience and flexibility (81.0%), (ii) avoidance of time off work and away from patients (62.3%), (iii) the low environmental impact and carbon footprint (32.5%).

Conclusions

Although these findings are preliminary and from a small dataset, they highlight the importance of customizing each pharmaceutical meeting or program with the target audience in mind.

Plain Language Summary

Pharmaceutical companies regularly conduct advisory boards and other meetings with health care providers (HCPs) such as doctors, nurses, and pharmacists. These meetings are important for getting feedback on new clinical trial results, competitors’ products, or educational campaigns. However, they are typically expensive and require participants to travel long distances and take time away from their work and families. When hosted in person, there are also issues with not everyone being able to contribute as much as they want, and people living in remote or underserved communities are often excluded. These days, pharmaceutical companies have a choice between hosting meetings in person, virtually, or using a hybrid (mixed) approach. In making this choice, the cost and organizer’s preference are usually considered, but very few people ask the participants what they prefer. To help answer this question, we conducted a short feedback survey among 443 HCPs participating in virtual advisory boards. We found that HCPs prefer to meet at least 2–4 times per year using a mix of web meetings and virtual discussion forums where they can contribute on their own time over a 2- to 3-week period. Hybrid meetings (in-person meetings with the option to attend virtually) are preferred over in-person–only meetings. According to HCPs, the top benefits of virtual meetings include their convenience and flexibility, small environmental footprint, and improved diversity. In conclusion, this article shows the importance of customizing pharmaceutical meetings based on the participants’ preferences.

Key Points

The majority of health care providers prefer virtual or hybrid pharmaceutical meetings/advisory boards over in-person–only meetings.

Health care providers prefer to meet at least 2–4 times per year and want to be provided with continuous updates on how their insights are being used by the pharmaceutical company.

Key benefits of virtual versus in-person meetings include their superior convenience and flexibility, low environmental impact, and the ability to hear from more diverse participants.

Introduction

Virtual (also commonly referred to as “Online” or “Digital”) meetings have been around for decades, with computer-based video conferencing services such as Skype emerging in the early 2000s [1]. Within the pharmaceutical industry, early adopters started leveraging web meetings and asynchronous discussion forums for insight-gathering and medical education shortly thereafter. However, in-person meetings remained the gold standard across the industry until the Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic was declared in early 2020. Since then, virtual and hybrid meetings have become commonplace.

Rubinger et al. proposed four meeting definitions: conventional (100% in-person), full virtual (synchronous), asynchronous, and hybrid (mix of in-person and virtual) [2]. Synchronous virtual meetings refer to meetings viewed and participated in by attendees in real-time but remotely, with no in-person component [2]. These are commonly conducted using web meeting software such as Zoom or Microsoft Teams [3]. On the other hand, asynchronous virtual meetings are conducted on participants’ own schedules over a predetermined time period (typically 1–3 weeks), with no real-time interactions. Pharma-sponsored asynchronous meetings often involve reading/watching provided background materials, reviewing novel data, and insight-gathering through question-and-answer segments [2]. There are multiple software available for asynchronous meetings, ranging from free, generic survey tools (e.g., SurveyMonkey) and discussion boards (e.g., private groups on social media sites) to secure and compliant virtual platforms with tools and reporting capabilities designed specifically for life science companies.

Traditionally, a hybrid meeting refers to a meeting held in person at one or many physical venues while some attendees attend remotely in real-time through web meeting technology [2]. An alternative definition is a meeting series involving a combination of at least two of the following three within a short time period: in-person, synchronous, and asynchronous. For example, an in-person meeting may be preceded by an asynchronous pre-meeting touchpoint to review and discuss data beforehand in order to focus the agenda and free up time for workshops and discussions. After the live meeting, an asynchronous or synchronous virtual meeting can be added to debrief, dive deeper, and address any unanswered questions.

In the post-COVID era, cross-functional pharmaceutical teams now engage virtually with health care providers (HCPs) and key opinion leaders (KOLs) at all stages of the product life cycle, from the research and development stage through clinical trials all the way to post-market approval and loss of exclusivity. Examples of virtual meetings include insight-gathering initiatives such as advisory boards, digital content councils, and conference huddles; learning initiatives such as educational webinars, case study presentations, speaker programs, journal clubs, and KOL ambassador programs; working groups for co-authoring publications or study protocols, as well as a range of other internal- and external-facing strategic and tactical meetings.

At a time when some organizers are pushing for the return of in-person–only meetings while others favor a hybrid or all-virtual approach, it is crucial to weigh the advantages and disadvantages of the different meeting formats. Typically, the choice of meeting format to use for a given project or program comes down to a mix of budget and organizer preferences. While these factors are no doubt important, a key consideration—the participants’ preference—is often overlooked.

With this in mind, the objectives of this study were to gain a better understanding of HCP participant preferences for the format and frequency of small-group meetings, whether ongoing communication from the organizer is desired, and what participants perceive to be the most important benefits of virtual meetings. Specifically, we wanted to understand how important considerations such as convenience, flexibility, sustainability, and diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) are to HCPs.

Methods

Between September 1, 2022, and December 31, 2023, HCPs participating in asynchronous advisory board touchpoints on a proprietary virtual platform1 answered a short informal survey about their future engagement preferences. The survey was delivered through the same platform at the end of the asynchronous activity, along with standard feedback questions related to the participants’ satisfaction and user experience with the portal. At their discretion, the pharmaceutical organizers chose to include 1–4 prewritten survey questions (Table 1). For all questions, the responses are presented as percentages of the total number of respondents for that particular question and shown both for the entire study period and divided by year (2022 vs 2023) to highlight potential differences over time. Statistical analysis of differences between 2022 and 2023 was conducted using the χ² test, with p < 0.05 considered statistically significant. For compliance and confidentiality reasons, and due to the informal and preliminary nature of the short survey, no personally identifiable information or demographic data (e.g., age, sex, race) were collected.

Table 1.

Survey questions and number of respondents

Question	Question type, answer options	Respondents (n, %)a
1. What is your preference for future advisory board meetings?	Select one In-person only Hybrid meetings (in-person with choice to attend virtually) Combination of synchronous and asynchronous meetings Asynchronous Synchronous virtual Other	338, 76.3%
2. How often would you like to participate?	Select one Monthly Every 2 months Quarterly 2–3 times a year Yearlyb Other	283, 63.9%
3. Would you like to receive updates on how we have leveraged your insights?	Select one Yes No	347, 78.3%
4. In your opinion, what is the biggest benefit(s) of virtual vs in-person meetings?	Select all that apply Convenience/flexibility No need to take time off work/away from patients Low/no environmental impact More diverse voices can be heard No language barriers N/A I prefer in-person meetings over virtual meetings Other	326, 73.6%

^aDue to the variability in the number of questions included in each survey (selected at the discretion of the individual pharmaceutical organizer), not all 443 respondents answered each question

^bDue to the low number of responses, ‘yearly’ was merged with ‘other’ in the final analysis

N/A not applicable

Results

During the study period, 443 HCPs (physicians, nurses, and pharmacists) answered the survey. The respondents were participants in virtual advisory boards and other small-group meetings sponsored by pharmaceutical organizers located in the Asia-Pacific region (Australia, Taiwan; accounting for 5.2% of virtual touchpoints), Europe (Austria, Germany, UK; 27.3%), and North America (Canada, USA; 67.5%).

Meeting Format

Figure 1 shows the preferred meeting formats among the HCPs answering the question ‘What is your preference for future advisory board meetings?’ (n = 338). More than three-quarters of the respondents (n = 257, 76.0%) preferred meetings with a virtual component (hybrid, synchronous, asynchronous, or a combination thereof), while only 24.0% (n = 81) preferred in-person–only meetings. The most popular meeting approach was identified as a combination of synchronous and asynchronous meetings over time (34.6%, n = 117) (Fig. 1a). Comparing the survey responses from 2022 (Fig. 1b) and 2023 (Fig. 1c), it is notable that the preference for hybrid meetings almost doubled, from 14.3 to 27.3% (p = 0.013, χ² test).

Fig. 1.

Preferred advisory board meeting formats of health care providers. The results are shown for a all surveyed health care providers (n = 338) and divided by year: b 2022 (n = 140), c 2023 (n = 198). Of the respondents who selected ‘other’ (n = 8, 3.3%), four specified that they prefer a mix of in-person and asynchronous (n = 2) and a mix of in-person, synchronous virtual, and asynchronous meetings (n = 2)

Meeting Frequency

The preferred meeting frequency among the HCP respondents (‘How often would you like to participate?’) is shown in Fig. 2 (n = 283). Overall, the preferred meeting frequency was 2–3 times a year (39.2%, n = 111), followed by quarterly (33.2%, n = 94) (Fig. 2a). In 2022, approximately half (50.8%) of HCPs stated that they would prefer to meet quarterly or more frequently (Fig. 2b). In 2023, this proportion was 58.9% (Fig. 2c). Although there was a tendency for the proportion of HCPs wanting to meet monthly, every two months, and quarterly to be higher in 2023 compared to in 2022, these increases were not statistically significant (p = 0.620, χ² test).

Fig. 2.

Preferred meeting frequency of health care providers. The results are shown for a all surveyed health care providers (n = 283) and divided by year: b 2022 (n = 132), c 2023 (n = 151). Out of the respondents who selected ‘other’ (n = 16, 5.7%), five specified that they would like to meet again within 12 months (n = 2), within 9 months (n = 1), on an as-needed flexible basis (n = 1), and 1–2 times per year (n =1)

Continuous Updates from the Pharmaceutical Team

Of 347 respondents, 306 (88.2%) noted that they were interested in receiving updates from the pharmaceutical team sponsoring the meeting on how the insights collected are being used (‘Would you like to receive updates on how we have leveraged your insights?’). Broken down by year, the corresponding percentages for 2022 (n = 150) and 2023 (n = 197) were 82.6% and 92.4%, respectively, reflecting a significant increase in the proportion of participants responding ‘yes’ over time (p = 0.005, χ² test; data not shown).

Perceived Benefits of Virtual Collaboration

The most important benefits of virtual meetings compared to in-person meetings (‘In your opinion, what is[are] the biggest benefit[s] of virtual vs in-person meetings?) according to the surveyed HCPs are shown in Fig. 3.

Fig. 3.

Top benefits of virtual meetings according to health care providers in 2022 (n = 116), 2023 (n = 210), and in the entire sample (n = 326). Survey respondents were able to select multiple choices; the results are shown as the percentage (%) of respondents. Of the respondents who selected ‘other’ (n = 8, 2.5%), two specified the lower costs (n = 1) and the ability to pause the meeting in order to look something up or take notes (n = 1) as key benefits. N/A not applicable

Of the 326 respondents, 264 (81.0%) stated that the superior convenience/flexibility of virtual meetings is a key benefit. In a similar vein, the second most important benefit identified by the HCP survey participants was not having to take time off work or away from patients to travel to an in-person meeting (n = 203, 62.3%). The minimal environmental impact of virtual meetings was voted as the third most important benefit of virtual meetings (n = 106, 32.5%).

The final theme that emerged in our short, informal survey of HCPs participating in asynchronous virtual touchpoints in 2022–2023 was the benefits of these types of meetings on DEI. In total, 74 of 326 (22.7%) HCPs considered a top benefit of virtual meetings to be the fact that more diverse voices can be heard. Having access to virtual tools such as automatic translation, subtitles, and/or expert interpretation to help overcome language barriers was considered a differentiator by 24 (7.4%) of the participating HCPs. No significant differences were observed in responses between 2022 and 2023 (p = 0.462, χ² test).

Of the eight respondents (2.5%) who answered ‘other,’ one respondent specified the ability to pause the meeting in order to look something up or take notes and another mentioned the lower cost as a key benefit. It was not specified whether the respondent was referring to lower costs for the organizer or attendees.

Discussion

Pharmaceutical Meeting Format and Frequency Preferences

The finding that 76% of the surveyed HCPs prefer virtual or hybrid pharmaceutical meetings over in-person–only meetings is in line with other recent reports on medical and scientific conferences. For example, Laohawetwanit et al. found that, among 562 pathologists from 79 countries, 80.1% (n = 450) preferred hybrid or virtual over in-person meetings [4]. Kays et al. likewise reported that 87% of 70 surveyed women physicians wanted an option for virtual attendance at conferences [5]. Our short survey showed that the preference for hybrid meetings among HCPs almost doubled between 2022 and 2023, while the preference for in-person–only meetings remained relatively flat. This adds to the existing evidence and suggests that HCPs still enjoy meeting in person but now expect the convenience of virtual.

In terms of the optimal meeting frequency, most respondents suggested 2–3 times per year, followed by quarterly, every 2 months, and monthly. Very few respondents wanted longer durations between meetings (i.e., every 9–12 months). As such, while the optimal meeting frequency and timing will vary on a case-by-case basis, organizers should consider engaging their KOLs and HCP stakeholders at least three times a year to cater to the majority.

The usefulness of regular and ongoing advisory board meetings is further supported by the finding that the vast majority of advisors (88.2%) would like to receive updates from the pharmaceutical team sponsoring the meeting on how the insights collected are being used. This indicates that HCPs and KOLs strongly prefer—or even expect—ongoing collaboration and communication from pharma.

Benefits of Virtual Pharmaceutical Meetings

Convenience and Flexibility

Convenience has been previously reported as a key benefit of virtual/hybrid meetings and conferences [4]. With the majority of US health care workers in 2022 belonging to the 25- to 34- and 35- to 44-year age groups [6], one can speculate that many have young children and/or older relatives requiring caregiving. Caregiving responsibilities often fall on women; 85.3% of women physicians participating in the pilot study by Kays et al. reported experiencing challenges with attending conferences in person. The most commonly cited challenges included childcare difficulties (66.7%) and work-life balance issues (65.1%) [5]. In addition, many HCPs work in busy clinics and may be dealing with long backlogs of appointments or surgeries stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic (see for example [7, 8]). As a result, once they have experienced alternative ways of participating in advisory boards and other pharma-sponsored events, they may be less willing to travel long distances and stay in a hotel for one or more nights to attend an all-day in-person meeting.

Based on the above, offering participants the option to attend in-person meetings remotely (virtually) should be made standard across the industry, at a minimum whenever traveling is involved. Depending on the HCP advisors’ preferences, meeting organizers may want to consider a mix of live (hybrid or synchronous virtual) and asynchronous meetings over time to maximize flexibility and allow HCPs to contribute on their own time.

Environmental Impact

Sarabipour et al. reported that flying to attend scientific meetings can produce air-travel-related CO₂ emissions comparable to, or higher than, the annual per capita emissions in many countries [9]. However, in-person meetings come with a substantial environmental footprint from not only flights and ground transportation but also the accommodation and meeting venue, catering and food transportation, audiovisual equipment, printed materials, and waste generation. Skiles et al. conducted a quantitative analysis comparing in-person and virtual conferences before and after the COVID-19 pandemic; the authors found that the cumulative carbon footprint of the total attendees to three virtual conferences in 2020 (1.07 t CO_2e for >7000 participants) was comparable to the average footprint of a single attendee at an in-person conference the year before [10]. In 2013, Achten et al. [11] found that conference attendance was responsible for 35% of scientists’ carbon footprint and that virtual meeting technologies such as videoconferencing tools could reduce their climate change impact by up to 44%. Likewise, Tao et al. [12] reported that transitioning from in-person to virtual conferencing can substantially reduce the carbon footprint and energy use of the meeting by 94% and 90%, respectively. These results are corroborated by a recent study by Gattrell et al. [13], who reported that travel accounts for 91–96% of total emissions of in-person medical conferences, mainly through long-distance and business-class air travel. In comparison, the authors found that the carbon emissions associated with virtual attendance represent only 0.3–1.1% of in-person attendance emissions. In fact, the carbon cost of attending an entire virtual congress was found to be lower than taking taxis to and from the airport and between the hotel and the congress venue [13].

At a time when climate change is no longer a distant threat but an everyday reality impacting numerous aspects of our lives, including both our physical and mental health [14], the environmental impact of meetings must be a key consideration for organizers when choosing the format. If going virtual is not an option, hosting in-person advisory board meetings in conjunction with large conferences that the advisors are already scheduled to attend, opting for regional and/or hybrid meetings, and introducing “carbon budgets” [13] are some strategies that may help reduce the associated carbon footprint.

Another factor to consider when choosing between virtual, hybrid, and in-person meetings is the effects of climate change in terms of more frequent extreme weather events; these events are known to be unpredictable and cause flight and transport disruptions with little to no notice [15]. Thus, if a meeting requires participants to fly or drive long distances, organizers need to always have a contingency plan in place. To this end, making live meetings hybrid by default provides a backup plan while providing superior flexibility and convenience for those who prefer to attend virtually.

Moreover, many pharmaceutical companies have set ambitious carbon-neutral or negative goals, and virtual meetings are one important tool in their toolbox to help them achieve these goals.

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

Virtual meetings, particularly if they contain an asynchronous component, promote DEI in a variety of ways. They effectively overcome geographical and cost barriers, and allow participants from remote, underserved, or low-income communities to participate more easily [9, 10, 16–18]. Time zone differences can be an obstacle to inclusive international meetings if real-time attendance is expected. By leveraging asynchronous meeting tools, differences in time zones and scheduling conflicts become non-issues [18]. Further, the virtual format closes the gender gap in terms of attendance rates. In the analysis by Skiles et al., attendance by women increased between 60 and 260% when conferences previously held in person turned virtual at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic [10].

In the context of pharmaceutical advisory boards, the virtual format facilitates multidisciplinary input by extending the reach beyond KOLs and specialist physicians to include other health care stakeholders such as nurses, pharmacists, community and allied health care providers, and even patients. In an asynchronous environment, advisors who may be hesitant to speak up in live settings, including junior HCPs, neurodivergent individuals, introverts, or people who speak English as a second language, are able to contribute equally to their counterparts, resulting in more representative insights.

Potential Downsides of Virtual Meetings

Despite the overwhelming advantages of virtual and hybrid meetings, there are potential issues that should be mentioned and considered when choosing between meeting formats (Fig. 4). These include a lack of face-to-face networking opportunities, lack of reliable internet connections in remote areas or low-income communities, and the risk of videoconferencing fatigue (“Zoom fatigue”) [4, 19, 20]. Of note, our survey results suggest that synchronous virtual (web meeting) is the least popular meeting format among HCPs when used as the only meeting format (i.e., without an asynchronous component) (Fig. 1). This supports the theory of videoconferencing fatigue and underscores the importance of moving away from one-size-fits-all cookie-cutter web meetings. Moreover, for hybrid meetings, there is a risk of virtual attendees receiving an inferior experience compared to in-person attendees.

Fig. 4.

Suggested advantages and disadvantages of in-person, hybrid, synchronous virtual, and asynchronous pharmaceutical advisory board meetings. Advantages (pros) are shown on the left, with disadvantages (cons) on the right. Each meeting format has unique pros and cons, with a decreasing number of disadvantages seen when moving from in-person and hybrid meetings to synchronous virtual and asynchronous activities

To counter the above challenges, Doran et al. [20] highlighted the need for proactive discussion (e.g., between organizers and supporting vendors) and consideration of accessibility during the pre-event, event, and post-event planning stages. That is to say, there are ways to mitigate these issues, including by strategically using a mix of hybrid, synchronous virtual, and asynchronous meetings designed to offer “the best of both worlds.” For hybrid meetings, careful planning is required to ensure that virtual attendees receive a comparable experience to those attending in person. This should include innovative ways of having remote and on-site participants interact with each other during workshops, along with behind-the-scenes support for, and monitoring of, virtual attendees to ensure that they are continuously engaged and able to share their thoughts.

Study Limitations

The current study has a number of limitations. First, it is based on preliminary data from a relatively small sample (n = 443). Second, all HCPs surveyed were participants in asynchronous meetings. Their recent experiences with this format may have skewed the data, and surveys for HCPs participating in synchronous virtual, hybrid, and in-person–only meetings should also be conducted. Third, we did not ask questions about the downsides of the various meeting formats or the benefits of in-person/hybrid meetings; the discussion around these was based solely on the published literature. Future studies featuring more specific survey questions, including questions on the downsides of different meeting formats and comparing different meeting durations, would be informative. Fourth, while rare, some participants selected ‘other’ but did not specify what exactly ‘other’ meant to them; in future surveys, providing an explanation if this option is selected should be made mandatory. Fifth, if an HCP participated in more than one asynchronous activity during the study period, it is possible that they answered the same question more than once, although most pharmaceutical organizers chose to include different questions each time. Last, we did not collect demographic data. In the future, it would be interesting to conduct a similar study assessing whether the responses differ between meeting participants from different geographies and according to age, sex, or race.

Conclusion

There are many factors that need to be considered when choosing the optimal format for pharmaceutical small-group meetings such as advisory boards, medical education, and KOL conference engagements. While costs and budgets may be the most obvious, the impact on the environment, DEI, and—most importantly—the participants’ preferences, are key considerations. Despite the study limitations, our data support the notion that HCPs prefer virtual and hybrid meetings over in-person–only meetings. Our findings also suggest that most HCPs want to engage with pharmaceutical teams at least 2–4 times a year in a formal group setting (e.g., advisory board meetings) and that they want to receive updates from previous meetings. In other words, they crave a long-term, mutually beneficial relationship, something that should be actively pursued by pharma.

The perceived benefits of virtual meetings discussed herein largely align with what has been reported in the literature, including the convenience of attending remotely and the better efficiency due to no loss of time for travel [4]. Sarabipour et al. [9] found that many in-person conferences and meetings are suboptimal in terms of DEI, venue accessibility, and environmental footprint. The authors concluded that online meetings are a viable alternative that, with some further improvements, can lead to a more equitable and sustainable conference and meeting culture. Our survey findings support this notion and suggest that HCPs and KOLs consider all of these factors when opting for virtual meetings.

Moral of the story: when planning your next HCP advisory board meeting, instead of assuming that everyone wants to fly across the country and meet face-to-face, consider asking the participants how and how often they would prefer to meet.

Declarations

Funding

No funding was received for the preparation of this article. The Open Access fee was paid by Impetus Digital.

Conflict of interest

The authors are employees of Impetus Digital but do not hold any financial stake in the company. Views and opinions in this article are those of the authors alone and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or positions of Impetus Digital.

Availability of data and material

Due to the confidential nature of the survey data, data are not available to be shared externally.

Ethics approval

Not applicable.

Consent to participate

By participating in the feedback survey, all respondents consented to have the aggregated responses gathered, analyzed, and published anonymously.

Consent to publish

Not applicable.

Code availability

Not applicable.

Authors' contributions

Cecilia Petrus conducted a review of the literature, analyzed and interpreted the survey data, wrote the article, and drafted the concepts for the figures. Holly Lam created the figures and critically reviewed the manuscript. Both authors have read and approved the final version of the manuscript.