5 Things to Know About the 2018 Janssen U.S. Transparency Report

The company just released its third annual report and leaders from across Janssen share some top takeaways, including a new initiative to include the list price and potential out-of-pocket costs for its most frequently prescribed medicine.

Scientists at the Janssen Pharmaceutical Companies of Johnson & Johnson work hard every day at discovering and developing transformational medicines that have the potential to help patients facing some of the world’s most challenging diseases.

To help shed light on what that tireless work entails, the company has just released its 2018 Janssen U.S. Transparency Report, which provides an inside look at how the company invests its resources in the development of new treatments, prices its medicines and helps people who need them get access to them.

In the report, Janssen also shares its ideas for helping to build on what is working in our healthcare system—and for fixing what's not—as well as details its plan to include the list price and typical patient out-of-pocket costs of a treatment in its U.S. pharmaceutical television advertising.

“We believe enhancing transparency is a positive step toward a more sustainable healthcare system—one that delivers greater access to care, at a more manageable cost," says Scott White, Company Group Chairman, North America Pharmaceuticals, Johnson & Johnson. “We issue this report because we believe open dialogue and partnership are essential to addressing the challenges patients face."

For this year's report rollout, we asked some of Janssen’s top leaders to share their top takeaways.

"The average net price of Janssen’s medicines went down for the second year in a row."Blasine Penkowski, Chief Strategic Customer Officer, Janssen North America

"In 2018, the average net price of our medicines in the U.S. declined 6.8%," explains Penkowski. "This is because we provided approximately $21 billion in discounts and rebates to payers like insurance companies and healthcare providers, outweighing our single-digit list price increase. Our business remained strong because physicians value our medicines and prescribed them for more patients."

"Janssen's research and development investment was significantly more than its spending on sales and marketing."Anastasia Daifotis, Chief Scientific Officer, Janssen North America Pharmaceuticals

"Last year, Janssen invested $8.4 billion globally in research and development—86% more than we spent on global sales and marketing, which includes our U.S. pharmaceutical advertising," Daifotis says. "We're proud to say that this significant investment makes Janssen one of the world's top research and development investors in any industry, anywhere in the world. It enabled us to advance more than 100 new medicine candidates last year; over the past five years, we've introduced six innovative medicines in the U.S."

"Janssen has introduced a new way to help make clearer to patients what they might pay for its medicines."Catherine Owen, President, Janssen Immunology

"Building on our commitment to providing transparency to patients, we will begin airing our first pharmaceutical TV ads in the U.S. that include pricing information," Owen says. "Based on what patients have told us is the most informative to them, the ads include a simple visual that shows both the list price and typical patient out-of-pocket costs for Janssen medicines. We'll start with our most frequently prescribed medicine, and will listen to feedback from patients and consumers to guide our rollout to additional brands."

"The company helped approximately 1 million people with treatment access, affordability and support—including helping to reduce out-of-pocket costs."Gina Giordano, Director, Patient Access Solutions, Johnson & Johnson

"Through the Janssen CarePath initiative, we provided approximately 1 million patients with options to help them get started and stay on the Janssen medicines their healthcare provider prescribed. Out of that number, we helped reduce out-of-pocket costs for approximately 550,000 commercially insured patients," Giordano notes. "Understanding health insurance coverage for medicines can be difficult. As mothers, fathers, caregivers and patients ourselves, we understand the challenges patients may face, and we're poised to listen and help as best we can."

"Janssen has ideas for bringing down costs for patients, and we are working with others to help make them a reality."Scott White, Company Group Chairman, North America Pharmaceuticals, Johnson & Johnson

"We've forged new partnerships with other groups in the healthcare system to explore different ways to payfor treatment, and proposed policy solutions to bring down costs for patients, such as putting a cap on out-of-pocket costs for seniors as part of Medicare Part D," White says. "We have a long history of contributing ideas and working with policymakers on both sides of the aisle to find practical solutions that maintain what’s distinctive about American healthcare—access to innovative therapies, personal choice and doctors and patients making decisions based on what is right for each individual—while working to fix what needs to be fixed."