Real-World Data: The Cornerstone of Life Science Consulting
Life sciences are at an inflection point. As pressure mounts to develop therapies faster, prove real-world value to payers, and personalize interventions, traditional data sources are hitting their limits. Real-world data (RWD), particularly claims data, has emerged as a critical lever across the product lifecycle.
For consultancies, this opens new terrain. Clients are no longer just asking for strategy decks. They want evidence that helps identify which patients to target, where care pathways break down, and how treatments perform beyond the trial setting.
That evidence increasingly lives in messy, fragmented datasets that require not just access, but interpretation at speed.
As the global RWD market is projected to grow from $1.88 billion in 2025 to over $6.3 billion by 2034, consultancies that can operationalize claims data will have a clear edge. But doing so requires a new kind of infrastructure. One that combines scale, structure, and speed.
The Expanding Role of RWD in Consulting
RWD refers to health-related data collected outside of traditional clinical trials, encompassing insurance claims, electronic health records, registries, wearables, and patient-reported outcomes.
Its value lies in offering a more representative, real-world view of patient journeys, treatment effectiveness, and care patterns. These insights may not always be captured through randomized controlled trials (RCTs).
For life science consultancies, this has opened new opportunities. Claims-based analyses enable more precise market sizing, richer health economic studies, and targeted provider or patient segmentation strategies.
As healthcare becomes more data-driven, consultancies must go beyond access to claims data. They need structured, de-identified, analysis-ready formats and the tools to explore them without bottlenecks.
Regulatory Momentum and Market Forces
The FDA is increasingly incorporating RWD and real-world evidence (RWE) into decision-making, both for accelerating approvals and for post-market surveillance. This shift gives life sciences firms an incentive to build RWD into their development and launch strategies earlier than ever.
The pharmaceutical industry, in turn, is elevating RWD as a complement to traditional clinical trials, seeking greater efficiency and real-world relevance in their research.
Meanwhile, advances in data infrastructure, particularly the digitization of health records, the rise of mobile health platforms, and the growth of claims databases, are expanding the scope and resolution of available data.
By leveraging analytical tools like AI and machine learning, consultancies can identify patterns within real-world data at scale, leading to more tailored and actionable insights for their clients. This capability directly supports advancements in predictive modeling, personalized medicine, and optimized care pathways.
The current environment creates demand for platforms that combine regulatory-grade data integrity with rapid exploration capabilities, especially for teams working under tight timelines.
Consulting Use Cases Across the Product Lifecycle
Consultancies now use RWD to support a wide range of use cases. In early R&D, claims data can identify patient cohorts, refine inclusion/exclusion criteria, and inform clinical trial site selection, helping sponsors reduce recruitment times and costs.
For rare diseases or highly segmented populations, this accelerates feasibility assessments and improves targeting precision.
In later stages, RWD plays a critical role in commercialization. Treatment patterns, adherence trends, and regional variations help shape go-to-market strategies. Health economic and outcomes research (HEOR), based on claims or EHR data, supports pricing and reimbursement discussions by demonstrating real-world value to payers.
Other applications include referral mapping, patient flow modeling, and demand forecasting. In recent projects, consultancies have used claims analytics to guide salesforce sizing, target provider deciles, and analyze regional growth dynamics.
In therapeutic areas such as oncology, cardiology, and immunology, RWD is helping to track outcomes, personalize interventions, and identify unmet needs at scale.