How to Demonstrate and Communicate the Impact of your Medical Affairs Team

Medical Affairs teams are often asked to prove their value with activity counts: interactions logged, publications produced, congresses attended. A 2025 Medical Science Liaison Society survey of 1,023 Medical Affairs professionals in 63 countries found that 92% of respondents reported using activity-based metrics such as the number of KOL engagements to evaluate MSL performance, while 70% said MSL KPIs should focus more on the quality of KOL and HCP relationships (Pharmacy, 2025).

In this webinar, Scott Thompson (CEO, Acceleration Point), Linda Traylor (VP, Head of Global Medical Excellence, Acceleration Point), and Renu Juneja, PhD (Head of Clinical Operations Program Management, Johnson & Johnson Innovative Medicine) walk through the MedImpact Model. The MedImpact Model is a framework that separates Medical Affairs measurement into three distinct layers: impact, contribution, and execution. Impact is change in the medical community's scientific awareness, beliefs, and clinical behaviors. Medical Affairs teams cannot observe clinical behavior directly, so the model measures the beliefs behind it. Contribution is how each team, such as field medical, scientific communications, or medical education, advances that impact. Execution is the day-to-day work that supports those contributions. The speakers apply the model to a hypothetical rare disease case and show how HCP mindset alignment statements turn scientific exchange into data senior leaders can act on. As Scott Thompson asks during the session, "When was the last time they reported to the board of directors the number of HCP interactions you had?" For a written companion piece featuring Linda Traylor and Renu Juneja, see How to Showcase the Impact of Medical Affairs. If your team is still reporting interaction counts to leadership, this is the session to watch.

What You'll Learn

• Activity metrics such as interaction counts, publications, and congress attendance describe what a Medical Affairs team does, not its impact. In the MedImpact Model, impact is always measured on someone else: the awareness, beliefs, and clinical behaviors of the medical community.
• HCP mindset alignment statements give MSLs a consistent way to capture leading indicators after every interaction. Each statement assesses one specific belief and connects to the scientific narrative and the clinical behavior that matters. Each also uses distinct anchor statements for negative, neutral, positive, and full alignment.
• Mindset alignment must be baselined and tracked over time. Capturing why an HCP holds a belief, not only the degree of alignment, shows Medical Affairs teams where scientific understanding stalls and which evidence gaps to address. Lagging indicators such as claims analysis and social analysis can complement these field-based leading indicators.
• A contribution story for any Medical Affairs team needs three elements: a specific outcome tied to the impact, a measure of progress, and a narrative that explains how progress builds over months or years. Renu Juneja recommends that impact data be clear enough for a senior leader to understand in about 30 seconds.
• Execution measures cover priorities, capacity, and capabilities. Renu Juneja calls for "ruthless prioritization" so that teams commit only to the work their capacity supports and avoid setting field teams up for failure.

About Our Speakers

Scott Thompson is CEO at Acceleration Point. Scott has spent more than 15 years working with Medical Affairs teams to communicate, measure, and improve their impact. In this session, Scott Thompson introduces the MedImpact Model and connects field execution back to medical strategy.

Connect with Scott on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/medical-excellence/

Linda Traylor is VP, Head of Global Medical Excellence at Acceleration Point. Linda brings 25 years of pharmaceutical industry experience across a range of Medical Affairs roles. She works with Medical Affairs organizations to apply frameworks that structure and quantify scientific work that is often considered difficult to measure.

Connect with Linda on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/linda-traylor-76a467a/

Renu Juneja, PhD is Head of Clinical Operations Program Management at Johnson & Johnson Innovative Medicine. Renu brings 25 years of pharmaceutical industry experience spanning regulatory writing, FDA submissions, publication planning strategy, and Medical Affairs. She previously led medical communications groups at MedImmune and Novo Nordisk, and she has served as co-lead of the Medical Affairs Professional Society (MAPS) Medical Communication Focus Area Working Group.

Connect with Renu on LinkedIn: [TODO: verified URL needed]

FAQ

What is the MedImpact Model?

The MedImpact Model is a framework Acceleration Point uses with Medical Affairs teams to measure and communicate impact. It separates three layers: impact, which is change in the medical community's scientific awareness, beliefs, and clinical behaviors; contribution, which is how each Medical Affairs team advances that impact through specific outcomes, measures, and a story; and execution, which is the day-to-day work governed by priorities, capacity, and capabilities.

Why don't activity metrics demonstrate Medical Affairs impact?

Activity metrics such as HCP interaction counts, publications, and congresses attended describe what a Medical Affairs team does. In the MedImpact Model, impact is always measured outside the team, in the awareness, beliefs, and clinical behaviors of the medical community. Activity counts can show execution, but they cannot show whether scientific understanding changed.

What is an HCP mindset alignment statement?

An HCP mindset alignment statement defines one specific belief tied to a Medical Affairs scientific narrative, such as whether an HCP believes a significant unmet need exists in a disease state. Each statement includes distinct anchor statements for negative, neutral, positive, and full alignment, so MSLs can assess alignment consistently after scientific exchange.

Do MSLs ask HCPs to rate their own alignment?

No. Renu Juneja explains that MSLs hold their usual scientific conversations with HCPs, then assess the degree of alignment and record the reason behind the belief in CRM after the interaction. Clearly defined anchor statements keep these assessments consistent from one MSL to the next.

How should Medical Affairs present impact to senior leadership?

Senior leaders, including business unit presidents, are often commercially minded, so Medical Affairs teams should present impact in a compliant format and language those leaders already recognize. Renu Juneja recommends that an impact visual be clear enough for a leader to understand in about 30 seconds, and that teams set the expectation that shifts in HCP beliefs take time.

About Acceleration Point Webinars

Acceleration Point webinars bring Medical Affairs and Field Medical leaders together to share practical insights, emerging strategies, and real-world perspectives on the challenges shaping the industry. Each session is designed to support the professionals driving scientific exchange, field medical excellence, and Medical Affairs transformation.

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