Internal and External Influences on the Adoption of the Fentanyl Patch

Abstract

The introduction of new technologies in health care, especially for pharmaceuticals, has been insufficiently investigated. Furthermore, the literature may be incomplete or misleading due to the absence of adequate databases to mine, along with the use of outmoded methodologies. This study on the Illinois Triplicate Prescription Control Program data uses the Bass model, a technique of evaluation in marketing, to examine a new pharmaceutical product diffusion, the fentanyl patch. We sought to estimate the relative importance of the interpersonal “word of mouth” influence and the external influence on prescribing. The study results indicated that, unlike traditional diffusion models that emphasize interpersonal influence, the diffusion of the fentanyl patch in the 1990s predominantly depended on external influence. Pharmaceutical marketing managers may find this approach relevant to specifically tailoring their strategies to markets that they have not yet penetrated. Moreover, health policymakers can also use this methodology for identifying suboptimal diffusion and developing interventions accordingly.