GW Health Agency

10/04/2026

Great night at the MM&M Awards! It's the medical marketing homecoming equivalent.

09/28/2026

What a Rainy Sunday Taught Me About Dementia Caregiving

On Sunday afternoon, I was driving home after dropping my daughter off at work. The rain was coming down hard. Up ahead, I noticed a woman standing on the side of the road beside an elderly woman lying on the ground.

I pulled over, rolled down my window, and asked if she needed me to call for help. She asked me to call the police. I had assumed the woman on the ground needed paramedics.

The woman on the ground was her mother. Her father had passed away three months earlier. Her mother, who lives with dementia, was convinced her husband was still alive and that her daughter was keeping them apart.

The entire time we spoke, her mother shouted that her daughter was "a very bad person and a liar."

The daughter looked exhausted. Worn down. Close to breaking.

After I called the police, I asked whether she was caring for her mother on her own. She told me her sister lives with them but was at work.

My heart broke for both of them.

Imagine believing that the person you shared decades of your life with is still alive, and that your own children are standing between you. Now imagine being that daughter: standing in the rain, watching your mother lie on the ground, hearing her call you a liar when all you are trying to do is keep her safe.

Dementia is a cruel disease. It takes a person's memories, their sense of reality, and often their ability to recognize the love surrounding them. And it places an enormous weight on the people who care for them, much of it invisible to the rest of us.

At GW Health Agency, we spend our days helping tell the stories of patients and the families who support them. Moments like this one are a powerful reminder of what caregivers carry every single day, often without recognition or relief.

To everyone caring for a loved one with dementia: I see you. Your patience, your love, and your strength matter more than you know. Stay strong, and please reach out for support when you need it.

Aleisia Gibson Wright
Founder and President, GW Health Agency

09/24/2026

Pharmacists are already delivering essential care in their communities. Now the question is whether reimbursement policy will catch up. 💊

The bipartisan Main Street Pharmacy Access Act (H.R. 3164 / S. 2426), sponsored by Rep. Adrian Smith (NE-03), advanced through the House Ways and Means Committee in May 2026 with backing from more than 190 organizations. Supporters include senior and rural advocacy groups, physician and provider organizations, patient advocates, and health systems. That's a lot of consensus for Washington.

What the bill would do:
✅ Allow Medicare Part B reimbursement for pharmacist-provided testing and treatment for flu, COVID-19, RSV, and strep throat
✅ Apply only where pharmacists are already authorized to provide those services under state law
✅ Keep scope of practice decisions with the states while adding a Medicare payment pathway for care eligible pharmacists may already provide

Why it matters:
👉 For patients: easier access to trusted care in familiar places, often during hours when a doctor's office is closed. That's especially meaningful in rural and underserved communities and in areas facing clinician shortages.
👉 For pharmacists: sustainable reimbursement is what keeps clinical services viable long term, building on the work they already do in vaccination, medication management, screening, patient education, and care coordination.

At GW Health Agency, we follow policy like this because it shapes healthcare access, public health, pharmacy practice, and how patients choose to get care. We'll keep watching where this bill goes.

Have you turned to your local pharmacy for care that used to require a doctor's visit? Tell us in the comments. 👇

09/23/2026

Psychedelic medicine is back in the conversation, and the timing matters.

While reviewing our daily media monitoring, the GW Health Agency team spotted an FDA public hearing on psychedelic therapies. The session brought together researchers, clinicians, and advocates to weigh in on how these treatments could work in supervised clinical settings.

The hearing follows Executive Order 14401, signed in April, which directs federal agencies to accelerate research, review, and approval of psychedelic treatments for serious mental illness. The FDA has also just finalized its clinical investigation guidance for this drug class.

The momentum is real, and so are the open questions about administration, access, and long-term safety once approvals arrive. That pairing of enthusiasm and scientific rigor is exactly what this field needs. Conditions of the brain are complex and notoriously difficult to treat, and patients deserve every effective option we can responsibly bring forward.

For pharma and biotech communicators, now is the time to plan how we'll talk with patients, providers, and payers about a treatment category that departs sharply from the traditional pill-in-a-bottle model. Supervised administration, new care settings, and new access pathways all call for fresh thinking.

The science is moving. Communications strategy has to move with it.

📅 Written comments on the hearing are open through October 5. If your organization works in this space, this is your moment to add your voice.

09/22/2026

FDA just previewed the next five years of drug review policy. If you work in rare disease or gene therapy, this one deserves your attention.

On September 16, FDA held a public meeting on PDUFA VIII, the user fee agreement that will fund and shape drug review from 2028 through 2032. The draft includes a meaningful shift in how the agency supports rare disease development.

The encouraging news: programs that have run as small pilots for years are becoming permanent options. Trial design support, model-informed evidence, and adaptive designs for small patient populations will be available to any qualifying sponsor that requests them. FDA is also adding new workshops focused on aligning rare disease sponsors and reviewers earlier in development.

The open question: FDA's cell and gene therapy program is shifting from active growth to what the agency calls maintenance. That shift comes as the CGT pipeline keeps expanding, and it raises fair questions about reviewer capacity, especially for therapies that demand the most specialized expertise.

All of this unfolds as FDA awaits its next commissioner. Whoever takes the seat inherits a mandate few outside our industry are tracking:

Keeping the drugs and biologics centers, which review related products, moving in sync
Delivering expanded rare disease support while review staffing holds flat
Finalizing a five-year framework ahead of a Congressional deadline, shaped by public comments due October 16

Rare disease patients and the companies developing therapies for them have waited a long time for permanent infrastructure. This draft is a meaningful step forward, and its staying power depends on leadership.

GW Health Agency is following this closely and will share updates in the months ahead. Questions? Reach out at [email protected].

08/04/2026

Proud to be featured in The Intelligence Record on a topic that's top of mind for every pharma marketer right now: the FDA's proposed changes to the "adequate provision" pathway for DTC advertising.

Aleisia Gibson Wright, Founder and President of GW Health Agency, walks through how enterprise pharma brands are using the FDA's rulemaking window to model channel alternatives before the rule is finalized.

07/27/2026

Pharma advertising creative is going through it right now. But I'm encouraged by some of the work I've been privileged to judge. I'm also issuing a challenge to creatives to step it up.

We come too far to get this far.

After judging the MM+M Awards, we have some thoughts on pharma’s state of creative — and how you can make your submissions even stronger.

07/22/2026

Reconnected with former colleagues at the PR & Comms Summit last week.

07/20/2026

I love a good prediction. I've cashed in on Kalshi bets myself. Go England! Go Cape Verde! 🇬🇧🇨🇻

But this latest announcement has me giving Kalshi the side-eye.
They just launched prediction markets on Phase 3 trial outcomes and FDA approvals.

Here's the problem: we already know what happens when the crowd includes someone with inside access.

Trump's teleprompter operator is currently under federal investigation for allegedly pocketing over $100,000 betting on Kalshi's "Mentions" markets, using advance knowledge of what the president was about to say. He knew the script before anyone else did. Then he traded on it.

Now picture that same setup, but the script is unblinded trial data. And the person holding it works at the CRO, the site, or the sponsor.

Kalshi does have guardrails in place: late-stage trials only, employment verification, predetermined resolution rules. That's a real attempt to get ahead of the problem.

I still wouldn't bet the house on those guardrails holding once real money is on the line.

Who's taking that bet? 👇

07/14/2026

Celebrating a new friendship made at Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity! Thank you, Valerie.