Governments and commercial payers across the world are hitting the wall with respect to healthcare costs. Drug costs have spiraled out of control especially in the area of specialty medicine. As physicians treat complex and chronic diseases, such as cancer, they’re using increasingly expensive specialty medicines and treatment regimens. But they face another challenge. While these medicines work against placebo, they often fail to discriminate exactly which patients will actually do well with a given drug. In the case of chemotherapy, patients may be subjected to months of debilitating regimens that don’t work for them personally.

Against this backdrop, manufacturers must make a convincing case to decision makers to reimburse these expensive new therapies over older, less expensive ones. In short, they need to make a case for the economic and clinical value of their products. Theranostics is a powerful new tool to help make the case for a specialty medicine.