Sustainability report

Patient experience & voice

  • GRI 103-1: Management Approach
  • GRI 103-2: Management Approach
  • GRI 103-3: Management Approach
  • GRI 413-2: Operations with significant impacts on local communities

Edwards Lifesciences works to improve the patient experience and engage the patient voice to support our aspiration of transforming patient lives with breakthrough medical technologies. As one of Edwards’ most material sustainability topics, we continue to evolve our program to better meet the needs of our patients. Understanding the patient experience and listening to patient voices strengthens our innovation, production, and delivery of solutions to help those fighting cardiovascular disease.

Definition

Continuously improving the patient experience with therapies developed with feedback and input from patients while empowering patients to support and aid each other.

Management approach

We understand that too often patients do not have influence over the diagnosis of their condition, the type of treatment they receive or how their care is delivered. Edwards Lifesciences focuses on providing patient-focused innovations that save and enhance patient lives. Patient experience and voice is one of our most material sustainability topics—excelling in being patient-first is consistent with our Credo.

Edwards’ vision to improve the quality of care for millions is led by technology, clinical evidence and innovative solutions to improve patient care.

Edwards is a leader among medical technology companies in establishing a formal patient engagement function designed to lead and empower everyone in the company to engage with, learn from and support patients and their families to improve the healthcare experience. We are a leader in our industry in best practices, including being the first medical device company to publish global guidance on how and why we work with patient organizations. This helps provide disclosure and transparency into our relationships to prevent potential conflicts of interest.

While Edwards Lifesciences throughout its history has always had a “patients first” culture and organizational focus, Edwards’ CEO has a performance management objective (PMO) tied to increasing employee exposure to patients, which further promotes a strong culture consistent with the Credo and our Aspirations. The Vice President of Medical Affairs and Patient Engagement is responsible for ensuring that all patient engagement activities are aligned with our Aspirations to transform patient care through innovative technologies and to attract and engage talented employees. Our global Patient Engagement team creates opportunities to better incorporate the patient perspective into our business strategy. They enable meaningful patient-driven innovation by authentically empowering patients, advocates and healthcare stakeholders to broaden access to treatments and transform quality of life.

Evidence indicates that empowered, engaged patients experience better clinical outcomes. For this reason, Edwards’ Patient Engagement function maintains and consistently updates an approach to empowering patients, including sponsoring patient listening sessions, conducting Science of Patient Input (SPI) studies, supporting patient advocacy groups who represent the patient voice and collaborating with patients to exercise their voices within the healthcare system.

Growing the patient voice through partnerships

When patients use their voices, they do more than just advocate for themselves—they inspire others to speak up and support each other in working toward healthier outcomes. We believe in the work undertaken by patient advocacy groups, and we are proud to support those organizations through resource sharing and charitable contributions.

Edwards Lifesciences provides charitable grants to the American Heart Association for their Heart Valve Ambassador Program, which connects heart valve patients to a group of dedicated individuals who offer resources and support, as well as the Heart Valve Education Center, where patients can connect with and learn from other patients. We also partner with the American Heart Association on Target: Aortic Stenosis. This program enhances the patient experience from symptom onset to appropriate diagnosis and follow-through, to timely treatment and disease management. The program consists of evidence-based measurement development to better identify and treat patients, as well as multi-media educational resources and self-management care plans for people living with structural heart disease.

The company supports Heart Valve Voice US – a patient-led non-profit that focuses on improving the diagnosis, treatment and management of heart valve disease and elevating the patient voice. Heart Valve Voice US is part of Edwards' international support of Global Heart Hub, a growing global patient advocacy non-profit federation of heart valve patient organizations reaching patients in Canada, the U.K., Ireland, Italy, Germany, France, Japan, Australia, Brazil and several other countries.

Other patient advocacy programs Edwards supports include:

  • Mended Hearts Trained Accredited Patient Visitor and Peer-to-Peer Advocate programs
  • Mended Hearts Clinical Trial Awareness campaign that educates, empowers and encourages valve patients to explore all options
  • Alliance for Aging Research's annual Heart Valve Disease Awareness campaign
  • Disease awareness programs led by patient organizations Sepsis Alliance and Conquering Congenital Heart Disease

Additional global patient organization support can be found on our Patient Voice web page.

The Patient Experience

The experience for those suffering from cardiovascular disease remains complex and filled with obstacles. The treatment process can be inconsistent from one patient to the next, and evidence indicates that empowered, engaged patients experience better clinical outcomes. For this reason, Edwards’ Patient Engagement function maintains and consistently updates the company's approach to empowering patients, including sponsoring patient listening sessions, conducting Science of Patient Input (SPI) studies, supporting patient advocacy groups who represent patients’ voices and helping patients and their care partners exercise their voices to improve the healthcare system.

Annually, Edwards hosts The Patient Experience. This event brings together patients and their care partners to connect and share their experiences with our employees and other patients. Before the global COVID-19 pandemic, these events were held on an annual basis in multiple Edwards locations around the world. During the pandemic, Edwards’ team pivoted to virtual engagements to ensure the continuity of engagement between patients, care partners and Edwards employees. Through this program, Edwards gains important insights into the patient journey, from symptoms and diagnosis through treatment and recovery, as well as the concerns and challenges that are faced along the diagnosis and treatment pathway.

This approach supports our target to ensure that our therapies are addressing the needs of patients through an increasingly collaborative patient engagement process. This target aligns to UN SDG 3: Good Health & Well-Being.

Addressing patient needs and connection along the journey to better heart health

Edwards strives to ensure all patients have a voice in shaping their treatment experience, and we recognize that many patients benefit from minimally invasive procedures. To increase access to minimally invasive procedures, Edwards drives innovation in Transcatheter Aortic Valve Replacement (TAVR) technology. TAVR allows physicians to replace heart valves with a catheter instead of surgically opening the chest. To learn more about patient experiences with Edwards’ heart valves, browse our collection of patient stories.

Our Edwards PatientConnect program extends our support for patients beyond their TAVR procedure, empowering them through information, resources and opportunities to participate in peer support, educational programs and advocacy. By cultivating a community of patients who want to stay informed and to share their experience with others, together we are improving the lives of people living with heart valve disease.

Patient resources

After the launch of Edwards' newly created Patient Support Center (PSC) in 2020, we saw the need for this patient resource continually increase. The PSC is a dedicated resource for patients or their care partners who have questions related to Edwards' products or services.

We continue to focus on raising patient awareness and ensuring patients have the resources and access to the therapies they need. To read more about our educational initiatives for better care and our work to improve access, please see our Annual Performance in the Access to Healthcare section of this report.

Edwards.com offers information on heart valve disease and treatment, as well as FAQs and a glossary of terminology. Additionally, our Reach for the Heart disease awareness website, along with NewHeartValve and YourTissueValve websites provide comprehensive information on aortic stenosis and options for treatment.

Edwards places a priority on gathering patient insights across the total product lifecycle, so we invest in patient preference studies among various patient groups to determine the benefit-risk trade-offs for new therapies. Using qualitative and quantitative methods, Edwards ensures the patient voice is heard from development to commercialization of new technologies.

Patient voice in product design & development

Edwards works to incorporate patients’ input into every stage of our product development. By listening to patients and capturing their input through both qualitative and quantitative methods, we can provide care that meets individual needs and preferences. From early-stage product design to early feasibility studies and clinical trials, integrating patient input makes our products more effective. This aligns with our Aspiration to ensure that our therapies are addressing the needs of patients through an increasingly collaborative patient engagement process, and that we will also continue to evolve how patient input is integrated into product development.

We look to continue developing quantitative data to evaluate the relative importance and value of products through the eyes of the patient community. We are the first medical device company to develop and publicly publish these kinds of studies, leading the charge in improving the patient experience. Some of our most recent work studied patient preferences when choosing between aortic stenosis (AS) treatments, taking into account the risk-benefit analysis that is done when choosing between two types of valve replacements. The study focused on the patient experience and how patients weigh the decision on what valve replacement to pursue, which informs Edwards’ future product development approach. In 2021, we broadened our approach globally, studying AS patient preferences in Australia and Japan to incorporate patient perspectives into market access decisions. We also completed a study aimed to quantify patients’ preferences for benefits and risks associated with treating degenerative mitral regurgitation (DMR) via open heart surgical repair versus a beating-heart surgical approach.

Annual performance

As Edwards continues to grow our business and expand across the globe, we consider it a top priority to maintain a consistent patient-focused culture. We recognize that patient engagement provides a powerful sense of purpose in our work for many of Edwards’ employees, and we continue to prioritize facilitating connections between patients, caregivers and our employees.

Patient Support Center

The Patient Support Center (PSC) was created to provide compassionate, responsive support that contributes to a consistent, positive experience with the company. During 2021 as awareness of the PSC grew, inquiries more than doubled compared to the prior year, with growth in particular in questions about post-procedure topics. Those inquiring are directed to their physicians for any questions that relate to medical advice. In 2021, the PSC also began supporting patient inquiries about Edwards' clinical trials.

The PSC continued providing an early signal of patient interest and activity for “hot” topics. For example, when COVID-19 vaccines were approved, we quickly learned that patients had questions about vaccinations and their heart valves.

Patient engagement and events

As a result of COVID-19, we converted our 2020 Patient Experience event to a global, virtual model in 2021, allowing employees to safely engage with patients through live videoconferencing. While the experiences were different than our in-person Patient Experience events, the virtual format allowed for more employees to participate, resulting in more employees hearing patient stories and nearly doubling year-over-year employee exposure to patients.

As part of this inspired pivot, in 2021 we launched a new hybrid patient listening session framework and hosted six sessions reaching 2,000+ employees. This increased our employee engagement with patients by 29 percent and allowed us to learn directly from patients about their journeys with structural heart disease, and better guide a number of our internal workstreams and efforts to improve patient access, experience and outcomes. In May 2022, we were pleased to be able to host The Patient Experience in person at our global headquarters in Irvine, Calif. – the first live event of this type since 2019.

True to Credo of creating a community unified in improving the lives of patients all around the world, The Patient Experience (TPE) has become an important way for us to hear from those who are directly impacted by our therapies. During TPE, we learn valuable insights from this community of patients and caregivers – lessons that ultimately impact what we do at Edwards, every day. In early 2022, we returned to our in-person model that was especially unique because this group of patients included many who were scheduled to attend in 2020. More than 80 patients, care partners and guests attended from around the U.S. and Canada.

Elevating partnerships focused on patient voice

Throughout 2021, we were challenged to find new, creative ways to continue our work in amplifying patient voices in what was largely a virtual engagement environment. To maximize impact, we focused on our established partnerships as an area of opportunity to increase impact. The pandemic continued to provide unique opportunities to grow these partnerships and reach even more patients, including:

  • Through financial support from Edwards, Mended Hearts trained more peer-support ambassadors to provide support to heart valve patients online and virtually, expanding their ability to reach more patients than prior years (typically, ambassadors connected with other patients in the hospital or over the phone)
  • With a grant from Edwards, Heart Valve Voice US, the Global Heart Hub and scores of patient organizations continued working to reach patients through social and earned media to educate them on the risks of avoiding heart disease care in the pandemic
  • Patient organizations supported through Edwards Foundation grants voiced their support for public policies to allow for increased patient access to telehealth services

Our aspirations

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Transforming patient lives with breakthrough medical technologies

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Fostering an inclusive culture where all employees grow and thrive

Material topics
Highlight story

Transforming Lives, One Patient at a Time

In May 2022, Edwards Lifesciences welcomed 80 visitors, including patients, their care partners and guests to our Irvine, Calif. corporate headquarters to get an insiders’ look into our more than 60-year history, meet the teams who made their heart valves and share their inspirational journeys with our employees.

Sarah Sue, a 20-year-old Ohio State University student who attends school on a volleyball scholarship, was among them. She and her parents, Mike and Carole, spent an emotional two days getting to know the company behind the heart valve technology that has forever changed their daughter’s life.

Sarah Sue is a congenital heart patient who had her first open-heart surgery soon after birth. She had to have subsequent surgeries, and, in December 2020, she made the decision to have her pulmonary valve replaced in order to continue playing volleyball. The transcatheter heart valve therapy had her back on the court just a few weeks after surgery, playing the game she loves.

Now, every time she steps onto the volleyball court, she thanks her new heart valve, which she affectionately calls Valerie. Sarah Sue has become a patient advocate through her collaboration with the American Heart Association and is able to bring hope to other families by sharing her journey.