Brian East
Head of Patient Experience, IBD Franchise
Takeda
Pushing the Boundaries on Patient Experience
Since arriving at Takeda almost a year ago, Brian East has effectively led all Entyvio strategic and executional patient experience work within the company’s largest global franchise. Well-tenured in pharma and healthcare, his experience also includes automotive marketing, real estate, and startups. Brian’s entrepreneurial mindset allows him to not only provide great solutions for Entyvio, but to continuously push the boundaries of what is the norm, offering a unique lens within pharma’s highly regulated walls.
Brian is dedicated to unraveling one of the greatest challenges faced in the pharma and healthcare space: meeting unmet healthcare needs. His primary focus is on the patients themselves, pushing to think of the human first rather than the notion that the disease defines the person. He has an innate ability to intertwine his empathetic “patient-first” approach into tangible, solution-driven tactics that will serve to further elevate the Entyvio experience and drive real business success.
While at Takeda, Brian has contributed to a number of initiatives, including taking the lead on important programs such as DE&I (diversity, equality, and inclusion), Patient Support (EntyvioConnect), and Patient Ambassador programs (both unbranded and branded). Through his work, he has remained passionate about prioritizing the voices that often get left out and forgotten. Brian strides to deviate from the traditional way of looking at a patient—from a strict clinical lens to focusing on the whole person and their mental, emotional, social, and overall well-being. He takes the time to establish new relationships with stakeholders across the IBD ecosystem, deeply understand their unique needs, and deliver optimal solutions from diagnosis through treatment.
Under the DE&I workstream, this has been particularly evident as Brian takes time to establish authentic relationships with “nontraditional” stakeholders and understand how Takeda can best address disparities in care in a collaborative fashion. Through several new mental health initiatives, including an industry-first partnership with Sanvello Health, Brian and the Entyvio team aim to provide patients with robust, on-demand resources to live a life unconfined by the nature of their disease state.
Brian offers a refreshing strategic voice that will undoubtedly continue to enhance the patient journey and help those navigating life with ulcerative colitis (UC) and Crohn’s disease (CD).
