Advisory Board Materials and Facilitation
Pubrica designs, prepares and facilitates advisory boards for medical affairs teams in life-science companies. A board is held because the company has a genuine scientific question it cannot answer internally, and the meeting time belongs to the advisers. Our medical communications writers define and document the advisory question, prepare the pre-read and agenda, facilitate the meeting and write the output report that records the advice and the actions taken.
- The advisory question is documented before invitations are sent, which is a compliance requirement and gives qualified advisers a clear reason to attend
- Agendas give advisers more speaking time than the sponsor, with structured discussion planned in advance
- Advisers are selected for expertise, not prescribing volume, with the selection rationale recorded
- Fair market value and disclosure are addressed, since payments are reportable under the Sunshine Act in the US and the EFPIA Disclosure Code in Europe
- The output report records what changed, because a board whose advice changed nothing cannot be distinguished from a promotional meeting
Advisory question defined and documentedIncluded
Pre-read and agenda built for discussionIncluded
Independent facilitationIncluded
Output report with actionsIncluded
Boards designed to deliver promotional messagesNot offered
Question → advisers → pre-read → discussion → advice acted on
- Advisory question documented first
- Advisers selected for expertise
- Agenda weighted to discussion
- Payments at fair market value, disclosed
- Output report showing what changed
Deliverables
Four Components of Every Advisory Board
Each board is designed to meet both the compliance test and the usefulness test: a genuine need for advice that the company does not already have.
Example from a board rationaleTo gather expert perspectives on the treatment landscape.We need to understand how nephrologists sequence therapy after first-line failure in patients with eGFR below 30, because our Phase III excluded them and the guideline committee has asked. Eight advisers, chosen for practice in that population.
Example from an agenda designThe balance between presentation and discussion is visible to everyone present. An agenda that is two-thirds slides signals to advisers what kind of meeting they are attending, and they respond accordingly.
Example from a selection recordSelection influenced by commercial value is one of the red flags named in the OIG Special Fraud Alert on speaker programs, and the same principle applies to advisory boards.
Example from an output reportA board whose advice changed nothing is difficult to distinguish, afterwards, from a meeting held for another purpose. The record of what changed is the evidence that the advice was genuine.
The samples shown are illustrative and anonymised. Hover over a sample to replay it.
Compliance and Standards
Advisory Board Standards: PhRMA Code, GDPR and GPP 2022
Advisory board rules focus on intent, and intent is shown by how the meeting was designed.
PhRMA Code (and the OIG speaker program alert)
The Code revisions effective January 2022 responded directly to the OIG Special Fraud Alert of November 2020. The alert’s suspect characteristics, including minimal educational content, alcohol, unsuitable venues, repeat attendance, sales-influenced speaker selection and compensation above fair market value, define the boundary.
Data protection (and the UK GDPR)
Profiling named clinicians means processing personal data about identifiable people who have not volunteered it. A lawful basis and a transparency position are required, and both are often missing from mapping proposals.
GPP 2022 (good publication practice)
The 2022 update replaces GPP3. It covers company-sponsored research, including translational, biomarker and real-world studies, and extends to preprints, plain language summaries and social media. Professional medical writing support is legitimate, provided it is disclosed.
Quality management (cert. H3CR9TCU20251212INDQM10N)
Our certified quality system governs how work is run, recorded and released.
Responsible Use of AI
Our Approach to AI Use in Advisory Board Work
Medical affairs work must distinguish scientific exchange from promotion, a boundary that regulators monitor. That judgement depends on context, jurisdiction and the individuals involved, so it is always made by our specialists rather than by an AI tool.
Why We Do Not Publish AI Accuracy Figures
Accuracy figures for AI tools are usually reported by the companies that sell them.
Pubrica therefore does not quote a self-generated accuracy figure, because it would carry the same conflict of interest. Instead, we tell you which tool was used on your project, at which stage, and what a specialist changed afterwards.
Our Process
How Our Advisory Board Process Works
We define the advisory question first. A board convened without a defined question tends to find one on the day, and it is usually a promotional message.
Question and rationale
We define and document the advisory need and set adviser numbers and selection criteria against it.
Advisers and logistics
We select advisers on expertise and record the rationale, contract at fair market value and identify the disclosure obligations in each market.
Pre-read and agenda
We prepare a pre-read that provides the background, so the meeting does not have to, and an agenda weighted to structured discussion.
Facilitation and reporting
We facilitate the meeting independently, then deliver an output report recording the advice, the points of disagreement and the resulting actions.
Our Experts
Your Advisory Board Team
A named team of subject specialists stays with your project from scoping to delivery. Your project coordinator introduces each team member by name before work begins.
Reviews the scientific content for accuracy and confirms that each conclusion is supported by the evidence. Each expert is matched to your field.
Writes the content against the brief and the applicable code of practice, with every claim traceable to its reference.
Reviews the content for scientific accuracy, fair balance and compliance with the applicable code before it reaches your internal review.
Manages the timeline, keeps you informed at each stage and coordinates the team so that questions are answered and deadlines are met.
Packages
Advisory Board Packages
Costs depend on the number of advisers, the format and whether facilitation is included.
Materials only
For boards you facilitate yourself
Quoted per projectBased on adviser count and agenda length
Delivery Agreed at scoping
- ✓Advisory question documented
- ✓Pre-read pack prepared
- ✓Agenda weighted to discussion
- ✓Discussion guides and stimulus material
- ✓Output report template
- ✓Chair briefing
The pre-read provides the background that makes discussion possible. Without it, the first hour of the meeting is spent on background.
Deliverables Request a quoteDesign and facilitation
End-to-end support
Quoted per projectBased on advisers, format and duration
Delivery Agreed at scoping
- ✓Everything in Materials only
- ✓Independent facilitation
- ✓Breakout design where useful
- ✓Live recording of advice and disagreement
- ✓Output report with actions
- ✓Follow-up with advisers
An independent facilitator encourages advisers to speak openly, particularly where the advice is unwelcome.
Deliverables Request a quoteBoard programme
Several boards across markets
Quoted per projectBased on board count and markets
Delivery Agreed at scoping
- ✓Consistent question across markets
- ✓Local adaptation where needed
- ✓Comparable output across boards
- ✓Themes synthesised across the programme
- ✓Disclosure managed per market
- ✓Input to the medical plan
A programme is valuable because its boards can be compared. Boards run to different questions cannot be synthesised afterwards.
Deliverables Request a quoteSend your draft agenda and we will assess the balance between discussion and presentation at no cost. Advisers notice this balance first, and reviewers check it.
FAQs
Frequently Asked Questions About Advisory Boards
If your question is not answered here, please ask an expert. No quote is required.
A board is compliant when there is a genuine need for advice that the company cannot meet internally, advisers are selected for expertise, numbers are proportionate to the question, compensation is at fair market value and the process is documented.
The OIG Special Fraud Alert on speaker programs lists suspect characteristics that apply by analogy: sales-influenced selection, compensation above fair market value, minimal content, and unsuitable venues.
There is no fixed ratio, but if presentation dominates the agenda, the meeting is not gathering advice and the advisers will recognise this.
We recommend a short framing presentation, a pre-read that carries the detail, and most of the time given to structured discussion.
Yes. Payments to US physicians are reportable under the Sunshine Act and appear in Open Payments. In Europe the EFPIA Disclosure Code applies, with national codes on top.
Disclosure is a documentation obligation as well as a compliance one, and it is much easier to handle at contracting than to reconstruct later.
It should be recorded. An output report that contains only the advice the company agreed with is the version that is hardest to defend later.
Disagreement is often the most valuable output, and the record that it was heard is part of what makes the board defensible.
Related Services
Related Medical Affairs Services
Advisory boards are one way of obtaining expert input. These related services provide others.
1STRATEGY AND EXPERT SELECTIONupstream
Medical affairs strategyIdentifying the evidence gaps that need advice. KOL mapping and insightsIdentifying advisers and existing knowledge.2PUBLICATIONS AND PLATFORMdownstream
Scientific platformRecording scientific positions. Publication planningPublishing board outputs where appropriate.Request a Free Review of Your Advisory Board Agenda
The agenda is the first thing advisers notice and the first thing reviewers check after the meeting.