ChatGPT and Pharma: Boom or Bust?

Recent and rapid advancements in generative AI platforms, such as ChatGPT and DALL-E, have sparked excitement and curiosity in people around the world. While these platforms offer the potential to boost speed, creativity and personalization, significant concerns remain about the risks associated with this technology. That’s even more true for communicators who work in a highly regulated environment, such as the biopharmaceutical industry.

As a leading provider of AI-driven insights and marketing and communications for the healthcare industry, Real Chemistry has already successfully integrated generative AI in privacy-safe and regulatory compliant ways to understand what drives patient and provider decisions, identify key audiences to engage with, and personalize communications for optimal clarity and impact.

We’re expanding this work through an enterprise-wide partnership with Writer, which we announced last week. Writer, the leading generative AI platform for enterprises, will help enhance the quality of our work and open new ways to reach patients and healthcare providers with accessible, personalized content at scale.

In an effort to help other health communicators understand how they can integrate generative AI effectively and responsibly, we recently led a panel discussion with GSK’s Gwendolyn Fisher and BMS’s Stephen Cofone at the 2023 Fierce Pharma PR and Communications Summit.

Below are the top five things we took away from that conversation regarding what health communicators must consider when integrating generative AI into their work:

Not Just a Fad

It’s clear that generative AI has exploded and is here to stay. Despite its current limitations, it offers immense potential for understanding vast amounts of data, helping identify biases, and enabling faster comprehension of complex information.

Human-Powered

Generative AI is not meant to replace human effort but, rather, to augment it. Although the technology is powerful, human expertise is necessary to guide and evaluate its output. Think of it as a starting point rather than a finished product.

Ethical Considerations

Generative AI has the capability to prevent biases, but it can also inadvertently create them. Keep in mind that output is only as reliable as the data fed into it. It's not perfect, so exercising caution in where and how the technology is used is critical. There are legal, financial and diversity and inclusion issues inherent in AI that need to be addressed before the full benefits of generative AI can be fully realized.

For companies, developing standard operating procedures around the use of generative AI is essential as they can play a pivotal role in managing risks and ensuring responsible use of the technology.

Sky’s the Limit

Most people immediately think text generation when talking about generative AI, but it’s actually a category of technologies that can be harnessed for much broader applications – from summarization to image, video and 3D content generation to chatbots and more. Different AI tools have varying strengths and limitations – they can’t be treated as one size fits all.

Integration is Key

To fully harness the potential of generative AI, it will be vital to integrate it throughout entire organizations, rather than confining its use to specific teams or individuals. This integration ensures seamless collaboration and knowledge sharing, allowing different departments to leverage generative AI to streamline processes and enhance productivity.

In the next five years, generative AI is likely to become ubiquitous in everyday life and in the tools we already use. But successful integration of generative AI will require a shift in the mindset of communicators and companies. Individuals and organizations that want to remain competitive will embrace these technologies and prioritize building new skills in order to use them to their fullest potential.

If you are interested in learning more about using AI tools to enhance patient or provider communications, click here to contact us.

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