inPharmatics

Read about why a Qualcomm Life executive says mobile health doesn't yet have an Instagram, and why it eventually will.

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) has launched a four-month electronic submissions pilot that will allow pharma companies to file centralised marketing authorisation applications using an interactive PDF form

Companies on the forward edge are putting a heavy emphasis on digital in their commercial models — but how can mobile technologies assist pharmaceutical and biotech firms in this transition?

Tablets to support the sales force – While sales forces are shrinking, they still play a vital role in educating prescribers on new medications. The pharma industry, taking the lead of companies like GSK, is starting to incent sales reps based on quality of service versus amount of sales (read more here in the WSJ). One of the tools that is helping deliver better service is the tablet. Reps with an iPad can deliver more interactive and engaging product information, capture signatures for compliance and make the most of a few quick minutes with a doctor in the time it would take a laptop to boot up.

Online and mobile drug sampling programs – Companies now have the ability to leverage PDMA-compliant mobile apps and websites that allow physicians to request free product samples that they can distribute to their patients to gauge efficacy and assist with adherence. Because the Internet never sleeps, physicians can do this no matter what shifts they are working, independent of time zone or location, 24 hours a day.

Direct-to-HCP mobile advertising – It used to be that most online and mobile advertisements for drugs were placed only in industry magazines, blogs and online communities geared toward healthcare professionals and general consumer websites. We see this changing, with emergence of mobile networks focused on healthcare such as Tomorrow Networks, which is comprised of more than 50 medical apps. Pharma companies can now buy ad placements in mobile apps made exclusively for physicians and other healthcare professionals. A physician can be looking up treatment information at the point of care and see an ad for a medication that is relevant to their patient’s ailment. That’s incredibly powerful for the physician and advantageous for the advertiser.

mDetails – Physicians want to learn about the best drugs and treatments for their patients. mDetails are multimedia mobile product presentations that provide information about drugs in a way that allows physicians to absorb detailed information at their own pace — and in their own time. Because mDetails are distributed on smartphones – it lets physicians fit pharma product education into ‘found time’ at any point during their day that’s convenient for them.

By employing a multi-channel approach and by helping healthcare professionals do their jobs better instead of just selling to them, pharmaceutical companies can reach their target audiences and develop deeper value-based relationships. The aforementioned examples are just a few of the ways that pharmaceutical companies can leverage the ever-growing mobile channel; there are many more evolving every day.

Free text in electronic health records, with the help of natural language processing (NLP) technology, can be used to create accurate clinical decision support (CDS) tools, according to a study published this week in the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association

GE is ramping up its investment in personalized medicine, reflecting the burgeoning interest in using genetic information to help tailor treatments to individual patients.

New study by Across Health U.S. reveals American pharma companies are too preoccupied with regulatory to worry about strategy or internal knowledge building.

This is an interview with Dr Kevin Pho on social media use by physicians.