2011

This article summarizes Eli Lilly's European experience using TeleWeb e-detailing, which combines a personal sales rep phone call with Web site surfing.

Many critics of pharma-supported CME believe this support leads to bias. Between 9 May 2011 and 13 September 2011, readers of Pharma Marketing News were asked to answer a few short questions relating to potential bias in industry-supported CME programs and how to limit the need for industry funding of CME. The results are summarized in this article.

Lipitor Won't Go Gentle Into that Good Generic Night. Pfizer is taking a number of steps to protect it's Lipitor franchise and it hopes that many patients currently taking Lipitor will remain loyal to the brand.

Allergan, Eli Lilly, Johnson and Johnson, Novartis, Pfizer, Novo, and Sanofi-Aventis filed a 'citizen petition' with the FDA, urging the agency to 'establish comprehensive, clear and binding regulations to guide the industry' in communicating off-label drug information to physicians and payers. Although the words 'Internet' and 'Social Media' are not mentioned in the petition, it is likely to hold up social media guidelines regarding 'unsolicited requests' that were promised as the first in a series of FDA guidelines.

Are we witnessing an exodus of social media

If pharma marketers are going to be successful engaging consumers (mostly women) via social media, then they need to be more sensitive about how they portray women in ads and very savvy about how they handle comments (if they allow comments).

While primary care physicians in general are frequent users of the Internet, oncologists see online sources of information as more important than PCPs and therefore may need less personal contact to learn about products. That was just one of the results from the 2011 Digital Life survey of 1,454 physicians summarized is this article.

This article focuses on Adobe Connect for eDetailing, a specific collaboration between Adobe and ConnectSolutions, a leading provider of private cloud deployments of web conferencing and collaboration solutions.

Pharmaceutical marketers have jumped on the mobile application bandwagon as more and more companies roll out health-related applications for smartphones and touchpads such as Apple's iPhone and iPad. But will the FDA regulate certain smartphone apps as medical devices? This article discusses the regulatory and other issues associated with pharma developed or sponsored health apps.

One survey says yes, pharma reps are important to physicians, another says not so much. Who are we to believe?