MDS Pharma Services Retools for Quality, On-Time Delivery

To supports its strategic objective to become the market leader in quality, compliance and client service, MDS Pharma Services (www.mdsps.com) announced a bold new brand promise in November – to deliver high-quality services on-time.

“In-depth market research with hundreds of current and prospective clients around the world revealed high-quality on-time performance to be a priority for customers of every MDS Pharma Services line of business,” said MDS Pharma Service Vice President for Global Marketing & Communications Susan Murphy Warren. “Employee research revealed that they believe quality on-time delivery is achievable, and testing with both employees and clients helped us to determine the visual expression of the brand promise: a custom bullet train and this headline: ‘Even in challenging study environments, your next milestone: On-Time.’”

But given the vagaries and variables of the drug discovery and development process, can any CRO really offer on-time delivery?

“Several of our lines of business and site locations already are providing 100 percent on-time delivery of high-quality reports and services to meet client milestones,” said MDS Pharma Services President David Spaight. “Others are making steady progress toward that important strategic goal. We will monitor and report our performance in order to make continuous improvements.”

After launching the brand internally with celebrations at its nearly three dozen global locations, MDS Pharma Services unveiled its new brand campaign externally in November with a train-inspired booth at the annual meeting of the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists (AAPS) in San Diego.

In addition to directing the CRO’s marketing and advertising efforts, the MDS Pharma Services brand promise also reflects its operational priorities. Those priorities include implementation of LeanSigma and other process improvement investments to reduce cycle time, achieve world-class quality, and serve clients better by expediting the drug discovery and development process. Many of the nearly 100 LeanSigma projects completed or underway in the business unit are targeted at reducing the time for reaching such critical client milestones as study start-up, biomarker method development and internal database clean. Such initiatives have improved the rate of on-time delivery of toxicology reports to 95-plus percent at the business’ preclinical drug safety assessment site in Lyon, France. In addition, the bioanalytical services team in Lincoln, Nebraska, has improved to greater than 97 percent on-time delivery.

To serve growing client demand, MDS Pharma Services recently opened a new 24,000 square foot global central laboratory in Beijing, China, and has expanded its early clinical research capacity in Phoenix, Arizona, by 300 beds, for a total of 420. Investments in information technology include implementation of a global, web-based study management system to enable central lab clients to track their clinical trial samples and test results online from any location in the world and to allow the business to adapt rapidly to changes in the dynamic environment of a clinical trial.

Employee Recognition Program

“Our entire organization and everyone in it is committed to delivering quality on-time performance to clients,” adds Spaight. “In fact, employees at each of our nearly three dozen sites have signed their names on banners proclaiming that commitment.

“Because we know that what gets measured and rewarded gets done,” he continues, “we’ve instituted a new employee recognition program to identify the On-Time Heroes who provide high-quality service on-time. Three such On-Time Heroes were recognized during a client event in San Diego.”

The three MDS Pharma Services On-Time Heroes were:

• Jean-Claude Anthoine, the architect of a program that improved the rate of on-time delivery of toxicology reports to 95-plus percent at the MDS Pharma Services preclinical drug safety assessment site in Lyon, France.
• Marie Chantal Bonhomme of the Early Clinical Research site in Montreal, who developed a new reporting format that reduced the time to produce a critical client report for regulatory submission by 20 percent.
• Pat Madrigal of the Global Clinical Development site in Irvine, California, who earned the nickname “Pat MAGICAL” for managing five successful on-time database locks across four studies covering seven countries, more than 2400 subjects, and more than 24,000 site visits in six months.

New Corporate Cause Adopted

To underscore the importance of keeping its brand promise of quality on-time delivery of services and to put a human face on its work in support of drug discovery and development, the CRO has adopted Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation (ALSF) as its new corporate cause. The Foundation’s mission is to eradicate childhood cancer, the number-one killer of children in the United States. The sponsorship reflects MDS Pharma Services’ long-standing therapeutic focus on oncology as well as its brand promise of on-time delivery to support clients and expedite the drug discovery and development process. The Foundation provides grants to support basic oncology research, career development for oncology researchers, and improved availability of new treatments.

“MDS Pharma Services is proud to be the first CRO to become a major financial supporter of the Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation and its mission to fight childhood cancer, one cup at a time,” says Spaight.

The Foundation traces its roots back to July 2000, when a four-year-old cancer patient sold lemonade in the front yard of her home to raise money for pediatric cancer research. For the next four years, despite deteriorating health, Alexandra (Alex) Scott held an annual lemonade stand and inspired others to do the same. By the time she passed away at the age of eight in August 2004, Alex had raised more than $1 million. As of September 2007, the Foundation had raised more than $15 million for childhood cancer research.

“We know what a difference new advances in cancer research can make; they gave Alex four extra years of life and inspired her to start raising money to help other children with difficult-to-treat cancers,” said Alex’s mother, Elizabeth Scott. “MDS Pharma Services is contributing to such advances through its sponsorship of the Foundation and through the work its people do every day. Together, our organizations are offering hope, and the gift of time, to children with cancer.”

The MDS Pharma Services contribution is earmarked to support two Foundation grant programs: The Pediatric Oncology Program Infrastructure Awards and the Young Investigator Awards. The first provides funding to hire support personnel to expedite enrolment of children with cancer in clinical trials. The second provides start-up funds to allow new researchers and physicians to pursue promising avenues of investigation. To date, the Foundation has funded more than 42 pediatric cancer research projects at 30 U.S. institutions.

In addition to supporting two of the Foundation’s grant programs, MDS Pharma Services will encourage employees at its locations around the world to hold Alex’s Lemonade Stands in 2008, including during the fifth annual Lemonade Days from June 6 through 8. During Lemonade Days, an estimated 10,000 volunteers are expected to hold more than 1,000 Alex's Lemonade Stands coast to coast in the United States. Visit http://www.alexslemonade.org to learn more.

Cancer is a major therapeutic focus for MDS Pharma Services, and an important area for clinical research, with more than 800 oncology drugs in development.