Healthcare Market Research Firm
SIS International is a healthcare market research firm helping organizations understand patients, healthcare professionals, and the decisions that shape adoption. We combine qualitative, quantitative, and secondary research to investigate needs, evaluate concepts, and assess commercial opportunities across healthcare markets.
Whether you are developing a medical device, refining a digital service, or preparing a market entry plan, start with the decision your team needs to make. Then identify whose experience and influence the research must capture.
Discuss your research brief with SIS International.
What does a healthcare market research firm do?
A healthcare market research firm studies how people experience, choose, recommend, purchase, and pay for healthcare products and services. As a result, the research connects stakeholder perspectives with market evidence so teams can assess options before committing resources.
For example, a clinician may value a device’s functionality while a procurement team questions its implementation costs. Meanwhile, patients may struggle with the steps required to use it. Therefore, a useful study examines these different perspectives rather than treating interest from one audience as evidence of adoption.
Market research supports commercial and service decisions. However, it does not establish clinical safety or efficacy, secure reimbursement, or replace regulatory assessment.
When to engage a healthcare market research firm
Commission research when an unanswered question could change your next decision. In particular, healthcare market research can help with:
- Opportunity assessment: Examine unmet needs, existing alternatives, and the audiences a proposed offering could serve.
- Concept development: Explore how people understand a proposed product, feature, service, or value proposition.
- Adoption planning: Investigate workflow, training, purchasing, and access barriers before launch.
- Patient experience: Understand friction across information seeking, appointments, treatment routines, and ongoing support.
- Launch evaluation: Track awareness, perceptions, and reported use while distinguishing them from clinical outcomes.
Also review what your organization already knows. Existing studies can narrow the brief and help your healthcare market research firm focus new fieldwork on the questions that remain.
Who a healthcare market research firm recruits
First, the right audience depends on how decisions work in the category. Patients and caregivers can explain daily challenges, while clinicians describe treatment choices and professional workflows. Hospital administrators, procurement teams, and payer stakeholders may influence whether an offering can enter routine use.
Therefore, recruitment should reflect relevant responsibilities and experience. For a clinician study, consider specialty, practice setting, and involvement in the topic. For a patient study, consider the care journey, eligibility, accessibility, and the burden of participation.
In addition, keep stakeholder groups distinct where their roles differ. For example, a caregiver’s account can add context without substituting for a patient’s own perspective. Similarly, an influential clinician may not control a hospital purchasing decision.
How a healthcare market research firm selects methods
A healthcare market research firm should explain why each method fits the question. Combine approaches when they answer different needs, rather than adding methods simply to expand the project.
Interviews and group discussions
Individual interviews allow detailed exploration of professional decisions or sensitive experiences. In contrast, moderated groups can reveal how participants discuss shared concerns and react to concepts. However, group agreement does not establish how common a view is across a wider population.
Explore our one-to-one interview approach and group discussion capabilities.
Surveys and structured measurement
Surveys can compare awareness, preferences, experiences, and stated intentions across relevant groups. First, define the audience and comparisons the analysis needs to support. Then plan recruitment and sample size around those requirements.
Also explain the limits of the sample. A large response count alone does not make findings representative, and stated willingness to adopt does not guarantee future use.
Patient journeys and usability exploration
Journey research investigates what happens across a care experience and where people encounter difficulty. Usability sessions instead observe participants attempting defined tasks, such as navigating a service or reviewing a prototype.
These approaches can identify confusion and workflow friction. However, exploratory sessions do not by themselves establish clinical performance or satisfy formal device validation requirements.
Secondary evidence and competitor analysis
For example, existing publications, official datasets, and competitor materials can establish context before fieldwork. A healthcare market research firm should check dates, definitions, geography, and the original evidence behind important claims.
For example, national expenditure data describes spending categories; it does not directly measure the market available to a particular product. Therefore, connect broad figures to the indication, setting, and customer group in your brief.
Healthcare market research firm support across development and launch
In practice, commercial questions change as a product develops. Early work may explore unmet needs and concept relevance. In addition, later studies can investigate positioning, adoption barriers, and the information different stakeholders need.
The FDA’s clinical development overview provides context for the separate clinical pathway. Its phase descriptions should not serve as a forecast of success for an individual candidate.
As development progresses, revisit assumptions about alternatives, care pathways, and access. Your healthcare market research firm can help identify which commercial questions need updating before the next decision.
An illustrative development timeline
Illustrative cumulative progression based on FDA phase-transition guidance. Percentages are derived estimates, not observed outcomes for one cohort. Horizontal positions are schematic and do not predict time to approval. Select a milestone for details.
- 1Phase 1, first testing in humans100%
- 2Phase 2, efficacy and side effects70%
- 3Phase 3, pivotal confirmatory studies23%
- 4Post-Phase 3 progression6%
Commercial research questions change across development. A healthcare market research firm can revisit unmet needs, adoption barriers, and stakeholder expectations before major decisions. These activities do not establish clinical efficacy or determine whether a candidate will obtain approval.
Source: FDA clinical research overview. The FDA gives approximate transition rates of 70%, 33%, and 25–30%. Multiplying them yields approximately 23% reaching Phase 3 and 6–7% progressing beyond Phase 3. The final milestone illustrates that calculation, not a directly measured approval rate. The time axis is schematic; FDA describes Phase 1 duration as several months.
Understanding spending and purchasing influence
Where care takes place affects which stakeholders matter. Hospital purchasing, outpatient practice decisions, and retail pharmacy activity describe different parts of the healthcare market.
Consequently, opportunity assessment should distinguish spending categories from product demand. The CMS expenditure accounts provide a reference for U.S. spending, but each study still needs a definition that matches the offering and target setting.
Also consider implementation. Training, integration with existing systems, staffing, and purchasing processes can influence adoption even when participants like a concept.
Where the care dollar goes
United States, 2019: share of personal health care spending by service, with tile area proportional to share. This historical measure covers goods and services directly related to patient care. Select a tile for details.
Hospital and physician services account for different parts of the care pathway from retail pharmacy dispensing. Therefore, a healthcare market research firm should define the setting and product scope before using these categories for opportunity assessment. These historical shares are not a current market-size estimate for an individual product.
Source: CDC Health Care Expenditures, reporting 2019 National Health Expenditure Accounts data. The CDC page was updated in June 2023. Directions of change in the interactive details refer to 2009–2019. Personal health care and total national health spending have different denominators; do not compare their percentages as if they were identical.
How coverage shapes access and choice
The person using a service may not be the person choosing, purchasing, or funding it. Therefore, a healthcare market research firm should examine how coverage, out-of-pocket costs, and institutional decisions affect the relevant care pathway.
For example, asking patients about a list price alone may miss the conditions under which they would actually receive a treatment. Likewise, favorable payer interview feedback does not establish a coverage decision or demonstrate cost-effectiveness.
Design the study around the market in question. U.S. payer categories do not describe every country's funding arrangements, and national spending shares should not automatically become recruitment quotas.
Who pays for care
United States, 2024: rounded shares of total national health expenditure. Medicare and Medicaid together represent approximately 39%. Select a segment for details. The final segment is the residual after the five published rounded shares; it is not an investment-only category.
- Private health insurance31%
- Medicare21%
- Medicaid18%
- Other third party payers and public health activity11%
- Paid directly by patients, out of pocket11%
- Remaining spending8%
Funding arrangements affect access, purchasing, and the costs patients face. However, national spending shares are not customer counts, measures of demand, or automatic recruitment quotas. A healthcare market research firm should select relevant payer perspectives around the product, indication, setting, and decision.
Source: CMS National Health Expenditure Fact Sheet, historical 2024 figures. Published rounded shares: private insurance 31%, Medicare 21%, Medicaid 18%, out-of-pocket 11%, and other third-party payers/programs and public health 11%. The remaining 8% is calculated as 100 minus those rounded shares and is labeled remaining spending, not a standalone official funding category. Rounding affects precision.
Choosing a healthcare market research firm
Ask prospective partners how they will identify qualified participants, moderate discussions, review data, and explain limitations. Also ask who will interpret the findings and how recommendations will connect to your decision.
Healthcare studies may involve sensitive experiences and professional information. Before fieldwork, agree on consent, recording, access to materials, and handling of identifiable information. Where relevant, clarify study-specific escalation procedures and responsibilities with the sponsor.
For international work, discuss local feasibility, language, and differences in care delivery. Translation alone cannot resolve differences in coverage, referral pathways, or professional roles.
Working with our healthcare market research firm
SIS International brings more than 40 years of market research and strategy experience to business questions. Our healthcare market research firm supports studies involving patients, professionals, and other stakeholders across pharmaceutical, medical device, biotechnology, and digital health markets.
First, share the decision, target audiences, countries, and existing evidence. Then agree on the research questions, recruitment criteria, methods, analysis, and deliverables. Depending on scope, outputs may include a findings report, sourced market overview, comparative tables, an executive presentation, or recommendations.
Timelines and budgets depend on audience accessibility, eligibility, languages, and study complexity. Therefore, discuss deadlines early rather than assuming that a specialized audience can participate immediately.
Healthcare market research firm FAQs
Can one study cover patients and professionals?
Yes, when both perspectives support the decision. However, use appropriate recruitment criteria and questions for each group. Your healthcare market research firm should explain how the analysis will compare those perspectives without treating them as interchangeable.
Should sessions take place online or in person?
Choose the format around the audience and task. Remote sessions can reduce travel, while physical product handling or observation may favor an in-person setting. Also consider accessibility, privacy, and participant fatigue.
Can focus groups predict sales?
No. They can explore reactions and help refine a concept, but they do not provide a sales forecast. Healthcare market research may require additional measurement and explicit assumptions to assess commercial potential.
How many participants do we need?
The number depends on the method, audience diversity, and required comparisons. For qualitative work, prioritize relevant perspectives and depth. For surveys, discuss precision, subgroup analysis, recruitment, and the limits of inference.
What should the initial brief include?
First, include your business question, product or service context, intended audiences, countries, deadline, and budget range. Also identify who will use the findings and what they need to decide next.
Discuss your project with a healthcare market research firm
Tell SIS International what you need to understand and whose perspective matters. Our healthcare market research firm can discuss an approach that fits your decision, audience, and practical requirements.
Our Facility Location in New York
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About SIS International
SIS International offers Quantitative, Qualitative, and Strategy Research. We provide data, tools, strategies, reports, and insights for decision-making. We also conduct interviews, surveys, focus groups, and other Market Research methods and approaches. Contact us for your next Market Research project.
