Digital Pharma – What next for European pharma and social media?
pharmafile | January 28, 2010 | Feature | Medical Communications | Europe, digital pharma, patient information, social media
Ever since the FDA announced its social media and internet hearing last September the big question over here has been what next for European pharma in this arena?
Already tightly regulated in its other marketing and communications activities, much of the industry seems to be waiting for hard and fast rules for digital before undertaking online initiatives.
It seems to me that a key influence on European change is the quagmire that is the provision of patient information.
Slowly a consensus – of sorts – has emerged on this issue with a number of key stakeholders agreeing that patients deserve access to better healthcare information, but challenge will be to translate this into actual change.
Patient information in Europe
A consensus? Really? Well there certainly seems a decent amount of common ground between the European Commission, the pharmaceutical industry and even some member states.
Starting with the Commission, and the stated position of its Enterprise and Industry Directorate on the issue is that “the time has come to improve the quality of information available to patients on medicinal products”.
So far so positive, except pharma oversight passed out of its hands in December, moving to the Health and Consumer Directorate (SANCO) headed up by commissioner-designate John Dalli.
At his mid-January confirmation hearing he told MEPs: “Patients have the right to have access to proper information on prescribed medicines.”
It’s a sentiment shared by European pharma organisation Efpia, which also believes in allowing patients access to better information about their disease and treatment – usually having to reiterate at the same time that it is not looking for the introduction of US-style direct-to-consumer advertising.
In the UK the Department of Health last year noted: “We know that people use information to support them in making decisions about their health, healthcare and social care.
“Quality information empowers people to make choices that are right for them.”
The Commission’s view on the subject is the one to watch, and if it can be translated into agreed information standards there could be huge benefits for patients. Some 85% of Europeans who are online use the internet to search for health information, but the quality of they currently find still remains more than a little variable.
There were moves to improve this situation. A proposal contained in the ‘pharmaceutical package’ of European reforms aimed to give the public improved and equal access to information on health and medicines, but this was last year put on ice by the Health Council.
Now Dalli says he will look again at the proposals, but he’s poised to re-shape them first.
After telling MEPs that patients deserve better information, he added: “We have to re-assess the proposal and put a better one on the table.”
Will European pharma get a social media hearing?
So, as the information debate rumbles on with no early end in sight, is there any chance of a European social media hearing before the information question is resolved?
Well, not from where I’m sitting, which raises the distinct possibility that the FDA’s rules, when they come, will be European pharma’s defacto guidance on the subject.
Shortly after the FDA’s public hearing in November I asked the European Medicines Agency about the possibly of them following in their US counterpart’s footsteps and holding a European hearing on pharma’s social media and the internet.
They said: “The Agency is not following the FDA hearing and we have no perspective on the pharmaceutical industry’s use of social media since this is out of our mandate.”
Fair enough, so I moved on to the Commission, whose answer was: “The European Commission follows the work of the FDA, however, as traditionally the two systems are very different in this respect, this is not a key issue of our collaboration.”
Granted this was before pharma came under Dalli’s oversight, but I haven’t yet seen anything to contradict this sentiment.
Finally to European industry body Efpia who are certainly keen to engage with social media tools, even holding a training session on the subject for senior members last year, but they said they weren’t actually following the FDA hearing.
However, there a few rays of hope for those in the industry that would like to see guidance on pharma’s use of social media and the internet.
After a fruitful six months of discussions the Health Care Social Media Europe group is poised to begin pressing in earnest for change and plan to meet in Berlin in March to gather evidence and support for lobbying for a European social media hearing.
If you want to follow these discussions their new online home is the easiest way in to the group’s regular weekly Friday discussions on Twitter.
So what do you think is next for European pharma and socal media and the internet? Is European guidance necessary – and will it be provided by the FDA? Leave a comment below or get in touch to share your thoughts on the subject.
Dominic Tyer is web editor for Pharmafocus and InPharm.com and the author of the Digital Pharma blog. He can be contacted via email, Twitter or LinkedIn.
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