Measuring what matters: Three themes to watch at the Measuring Patient Engagement Europe Summit 2026

Patient centricity is increasingly embedded across healthcare research and decision-making, but demonstrating its impact remains challenging. Ahead of the Measuring Patient Engagement Europe Summit 2026, Journal of Patient Centricity Editor Sankeetha Nadarajah explores three themes she will be following in London, from measuring the value of engagement to embedding patient perspectives across the product lifecycle.

Patient centricity has become an increasingly important principle across healthcare research and decision-making. But as organizations seek to embed the patient voice more systematically across the product lifecycle, attention is increasingly turning to how its influence can be demonstrated and measured.

These questions will be a key focus at the Measuring Patient Engagement Europe Summit, taking place in London from September 15–17, 2026. This year’s program looks beyond the case for patient engagement to consider how organizations can translate engagement into measurable impact and meaningful changes in decision-making.

These are issues that closely align with our coverage at the Journal of Patient Centricity and across The Evidence Base, where we continue to explore how patient perspectives can inform research, evidence generation, value assessment and healthcare decision-making.

As Editor of the Journal of Patient Centricity, I will be attending the meeting in London to hear how organizations are approaching these challenges in practice. Looking across the program, three themes in particular stand out.

Demonstrating the value and impact of patient engagement

As patient engagement becomes more widely embedded across healthcare, demonstrating how it influences research, evidence generation and decision-making is becoming increasingly important. Two focused workshops will explore practical strategies for integrating patient engagement KPIs and patient experience data (PED) across the product lifecycle, from early research and development through to regulatory submissions and health technology assessment (HTA). Speakers will examine how organizations can align stakeholders, develop consistent metrics and governance frameworks, and draw on real-world examples, multi-stakeholder initiatives and emerging policy frameworks to demonstrate the impact of patient engagement.

Why I'm looking forward to these sessions: These interactive pre-meeting workshops will move beyond measuring whether patient engagement has taken place to explore how organizations can demonstrate its value and impact. I’m keen to hear how organizations are moving patient engagement from a standalone activity towards a more embedded, cross-functional approach, and what this means for patients and decision-making. We spoke with Hayley Chapman in December 2023 about the patient engagement and PED landscape across regulatory and HTA decision-making. Nearly three years on, I’m looking forward to hearing her latest perspective on how the landscape has evolved and where progress is still needed.

Selected sessions

• Workshop A: From Silos to Synergy: Operationalising Patient Engagement KPIs Across Your Organisation

Date and time: Tuesday September 15, 2026, 9.00am
Speaker: Emma Sutcliffe (ISPEP)

• Workshop B: Unlocking the Value of Patient Experience Data: From Research to Regulation

Date and time: Tuesday September 15, 2026, 12.00pm
Speakers: Hayley Chapman (PFMD) and Maddalena Benivento (The Synergist)

Embedding patient centricity across the product lifecycle

Integrating patient perspectives throughout the product lifecycle can help ensure that patient needs inform decisions from early research through to access and commercialization. Several sessions will explore how organizations can build end-to-end patient engagement strategies that balance business priorities with unmet patient needs, measure both patient and business value, and embed the patient voice across R&D, access and commercialization. Topics will include patient-centric early research, patient-driven Target Value Profiles, company-wide engagement frameworks, lived-experience insights and approaches for translating qualitative patient insights into meaningful metrics.

Why I'm looking forward to these sessions: A key focus for the Journal of Patient Centricity is exploring what patient centricity looks like in practice and how patient perspectives can meaningfully influence research and decision-making. I’m looking forward to hearing real-world examples of how organizations are embedding the patient voice across different stages of the product lifecycle, and how they are demonstrating the difference this makes.

Selected sessions

• How to Define the Impact of Patient Engagement in Early Research: A Target Value Profile Approach

Date and time: Wednesday September 16, 2026, 9.30am
Speaker: Oleksandr Gorbenko (OLGOPAEX ACADEMY)

• From Insight to Impact: Integrating Feasibility With Patient & Site Engagement to Measure What Truly Drives Trial Success

Date and time: Wednesday September 16, 2026, 11.30am
Speaker: Pinal Patel (Johnson & Johnson)

Measuring what matters to patients

As organizations develop more sophisticated approaches to measuring patient engagement, ensuring that those measures reflect what matters to patients is increasingly important. The final day of the meeting will explore how organizations can operationalize patient engagement KPI frameworks and use patient-centered metrics to demonstrate impact across different functions and stages of the product lifecycle. Sessions will cover patient engagement commitments, payer readiness and HTA strategies, C-suite KPIs, impact-driven measurement frameworks in medical affairs, behavioral science approaches and pre-competitive collaboration to standardize patient engagement metrics.

Why I'm looking forward to these sessions: I’m keen to hear how organizations are moving from measuring engagement activity to measuring outcomes that genuinely matter to patients. Greater standardization could help demonstrate the impact of patient engagement, but it is equally important that metrics reflect the needs and experiences of different patient populations. This is something Christian J Hendriksz recently explored in the Journal of Patient Centricity, highlighting how established approaches to patient centricity and measurement may not always translate across different cultural and socioeconomic contexts. His article reinforces an important question for these discussions: as we standardize patient engagement metrics, how do we ensure they continue to measure what matters to the patients and communities they are intended to represent?

Selected sessions

• Operationalising Patient Engagement in Rare Diseases: Building, Validating, & Evolving KPI Frameworks

Date and time: Thursday September 17, 2026, 9.00am
Speaker: Donatella Decise (Sobi)

• Roundtable: Advancing Pre-Competitive Collaboration to Standardise Patient Engagement Metrics

Date and time: Thursday September 17, 2026, 1.30pm
Speaker: Daniele Pesaresi (Chiesi)

Continuing the conversation on patient centricity

The Journal of Patient Centricity is a media partner for the Measuring Patient Engagement Europe Summit 2026. I’ll be attending the meeting in London and reporting on the discussions, examples and emerging approaches that could help advance patient centricity in practice. Please contact me directly if you'd like to arrange a quick chat on site. 

And follow the Journal of Patient Centricity and The Evidence Base on Linkedin for updates from the meeting and our post-conference coverage.