Social Media
Social Media Trends, Regs, and Apps
Featured Briefs: Janssen Healthcare Innovation Develops Mobile Medication Reminder Platformfs: Janssen’s Mobile Adherence Platform is Product Agnostic Sermo Beefs Up Interactive Health Education Centers Txt4Health spreads diabetes awareness in New Orleans Merck and Geisinger Partner on Care Management Solutions TECH CHECK Apps, Tweets, and Videos… Janssen’s Mobile Adherence Platform is Product Agnostic Janssen Healthcare Innovation, a team within Janssen Research & Development, has launched Care4Today Mobile Adherence, a secure messaging platform, mobile application, and website designed to improve adherence to treatment regimens through reminders to take medications, refill prescriptions, and visit healthcare providers. The Care4Today Mobile Adherence platform works with almost any phone with Web browsing capabilities, regardless of platform or service provider, including iPhone, BlackBerry, and Android devices, as well as many feature phones. The mobile adherence platform can be used for any kind of prescription or over-the-counter medication or nutritional supplement, including, but not limited to, products from the Johnson & Johnson family of companies. The No. 1 reason people give for not taking their medication is they simply forget. Studies have shown that text message reminders effectively improve medication adherence. Each self-directed reminder message requires a response that is recorded in the user’s adherence record stored on the secure and privacy-protected care4today.com website. From the website, users can monitor their adherence record or print it to share with their healthcare provider. { For more information, visit care4today.com. Txt4Health spreads diabetes awareness in New Orleans Txt4health, a mobile health information service designed to help people understand their risk for Type 2 diabetes, launched this year in New Orleans, where almost 60% of the population falls into a diabetes risk category. According to Nebeyou Adebe, project manager for the Louisiana Public Health Institute, the program is enrolling an average of 200 new participants per month. The 14-week text-based program encourages participants to engage with and manage their health, helps them assess their Type 2 diabetes risk level, sets individualized goals for increased activity and weight loss, and provides connections to local healthcare providers and existing wellness and diabetes prevention resources already available. Individuals enroll in the program by texting “HEALTH" to 300400 using their mobile phones. To set up a personal profile, each participant is asked brief questions that assess their risk for Type 2 diabetes. Based on their text responses, individuals receive SMS text messages each week with timely, relevant information to help them improve and manage their health. The txt4health program is sponsored by the American Diabetes Association, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, Voxiva, and the three Beacon Communities that are piloting this program: Crescent City (New Orleans), Southeast Michigan, and Greater Cincinnati. The txt4health initiative is one of the largest public health-based text messaging efforts in the country. Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana is txt4health’s local founding sponsor. { For more information, visit txt4health.com. Sermo Beefs Up Interactive Health Education Centers In an attempt to enhance physician collaboration through the use and sharing of Web-based tools and applications, Sermo is partnering with TheVisualMD, a producer of visual health content, to provide doctors with content enabling cross-disciplinary discussion and collaboration on key therapeutic areas and disease states. The initial offerings began in July with Sermo health education centers, which will combine member discussion on clinical cases, content from KOLs, leading medical journals, and research institutions with rich, visual anatomical education tools that incorporate real data derived from MRI, CT scans, and 3D microscopy. TheVisualMD, operated by medical imaging company Anatomical Travelogue that develops visualization software for physicians on human anatomy, brings similar health information to the public to improve patient education. { For more information, visit sermo.com and thevisualmd.com. Merck and Geisinger Partner on Care Management Solutions Geisinger Health System and Merck will collaborate on tools that facilitate shared decision-making between patients and physicians to improve adherence to treatment plans and clinical care processes. The first tool being developed is an interactive Web application designed to help primary care clinicians assess and engage patients at risk for cardiometabolic syndrome. The Web application and other care management solutions that Merck and Geisinger develop will initially be tested within the Geisinger system. Geisinger is a physician-led, nonprofit enterprise that treats patients and provides insurance. It is often cited as one of the most innovative healthcare operations in the country. Merck says it will contribute millions of dollars in employee time and energy, but not product, meaning the collaboration is agnostic regarding brand or company. In other words, Geisinger physicians will be expected to write prescriptions that are the best solution for the patient, regardless of manufacturer. { For more information, visit merck.com/newsroom/ news-release…/2012_0618.html. Apps… Wilson launches Mobile sales apps Wilson Learning has developed five core sales and communications programs, available through mobile Web apps that allow for quick reference and reinforcement of key concepts to extend the learning to application on the job. These apps can be accessed on a phone, tablet, or computer just before an in-person or phone appointment. For example, if a salesperson is meeting with a client who has a different communication style than his or her own, the rep can access the app to get tips on how to modify the communication style to reflect that of the customer and how best to interact to make the client comfortable. { For more information, visit wilsonlearning-americas.com. AstraZeneca develops prostate cancer management app AstraZeneca has launched its first consumer-focused app in the U.K., a free Prostate Assistant for the iPhone, iPad, and Android smartphones to provide cancer information and management tools. The app allows users to manage medical appointments. Users can also record notes and monitor their PSA levels. { To download, visit itunes.apple.com/gb/ app/prostate-assistant/id541591612?mt=8 Tweets… Millennium Tweetchats at Bio Millennium: The Takeda Oncology Company’s CEO Dr. Deborah Dunsire (@Millennium_US) was one of several industry leaders to participate in a Tweetchat with Luke Timmerman (@ldtimmerman) from Xconomy during BIO in Boston, June 18. Archives of the chats can be found by searching: #xcbiochat #BIO2012 twitter platform predicts illness According to a report in New Scientist and his own website, Adam Sadilek from the University of Rochester, New York, and his colleagues analyzed 4.4 million tweets tagged with GPS location data from more than 630,000 users in the New York City area and found that they can predict when an individual will come down with the flu up to eight days before he or she shows symptoms. The platform can also provide daily updates on where outbreaks are occurring and how they’re spreading. The researchers were able to predict when healthy people were about to fall ill — and then tweet about it — with about 90% accuracy. Mr. Sadilek focuses his studies on computational analysis, modeling, and prediction of complex phenomena, namely human behavior exhibited both offline and online. He is interested in developing scalable machine learning techniques that help understand and predict emergent global processes, such as disease epidemics, from day-to-day interactions of individuals. { For more information, visit cs.rochester.edu/~sadilek/research/ GE continues tweets for breast cancer awareness GE Healthcare’s Breast Cancer Mosaic program, which has been active since October 2009, helps to tell the stories of women, men, caregivers, and medical professionals who have been touched by breast cancer. The site is designed as a sharing mechanism for stories as well as a platform for providing information about the disease. { For more information, follow @GEhealthcare #breastcancer Social networking… AZ and Enlight Bio create search platform built on sharing science AstraZeneca and Enlight Biosciences have partnered to develop KNODE, a Web-based solution for providing a comprehensive view of life-science experts and their work. Knode is preparing to launch an automated search platform to help individual researchers, academic institutions, and companies to discover new connections to foster community and the exchange of scientific knowledge within and beyond their organizations. It’s being called the next-generation networking platform, connecting patients with the right experts at the right time. { For more information, visit astrazeneca.com. Videos… Genentech breaks down the HER pathway A new video from Genentech explains the HER pathways and gene overexpressions that are responsible for causing breast cancer. Dietmar Berger, Genentech VP of clinical oncology, discusses the role of the HER2 receptor in metastatic breast cancer in a simplified manner, making the process more accessible to patients. The short video is part of a series called Gene Expressions. { To upload video visit: youtube.com/watch?v=Q3Tzc3jGt3U Novartis continues rare disease series Novartis’ chapter five of its six-chapter video series highlights the medical advances in the past decade to treat gastrointestinal stromal tumors or GIST, which is a rare and life-threatening cancer affecting 10 to 20 people per million. In the Real Life Impact chapter, several patients tell their heartfelt stories about diagnosis and coping with their life with cancer. The video also provides educational material on GIST. { To upload video visit: youtube.com/watch?v=x8nXU_UNfPY&feature=youtu.be Send us your favorite industry apps, Twitter feeds, YouTube videos, and Facebook links to [email protected].
