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March 2009 44 3 Issue of MMM

Editor's Desk

Pharma's e-vangelists

In some ways, last month's ePharma Summit in Philadelphia (the ninth one, can you believe?) felt a little like the one before it, and even ...

Features

Sales Force Report: Training

E-learning is poised to replace traditional training models as pharma adjusts to a new landscape where sales reps need to be more technology savvy. Anthony ...

Sales Force Report: Effective Product Messages

An effective product message is the culmination of a process that starts with understanding the market and identifying where your product would fit in. Donna ...

Statins: Making New Friends

Single agent statins are still the cornerstone of cholesterol treatment, but with generic Zocor gaining ground and Lipitor's approaching patent expiry, manufacturers are looking to ...

Payers: Plan Early or Pay the Price

Drug firms should begin developing pricing, reimbursement and access strategies prior to launch. Kevin Barnett examines how addressing payer-related strategies early will help products succeed ...

Medical Advertising Hall of Fame Induction 2009

Hundreds of healthcare advertising and publishing leaders gathered at New York's Pierre Hotel for a celebratory dinner to honor four of the industry's biggest superstars.

Headliner: Elsevier's Ed Silverman

A reporter for more than a quarter-century, Ed Silverman began covering the pharma industry for The Star-Ledger of New Jersey in 1995.

Antidote

This February is an exciting month for the company GTC Biotherapeutics and the future of the biotechnology of preventing blood clots.

In Focus

Does Pfizer's merge-and-purge cost the company R&D?

Has the drug industry simply gotten too big for its britches? We wondered when we got word of Pfizer's latest binge and purge, a drill ...

Med Ed Report

Physician Payments Sunshine Act back with sharper teeth

Sens. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Herb Kohl (D-WI) reintroduced their Physician Payments Sunshine Act, which would require that manufacturers and group purchasing organizations disclose all ...

Survey: docs like pharma-funded CME programs

A survey of physicians found only 9% opposed to funding for CME programs from drug and device manufacturers.

ACCME to post hours, support

The Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education said it would begin posting information on all accredited providers, including whether or not they accept commercial support.

Boston Visitors Bureau losing money because of new state regulations

The president of the Greater Boston Convention and Visitors Bureau told The Boston Globe that at least two large medical conferences have withdrawn from the ...

PeerPoint Medical Education Institute no longer tied to MedPoint Communications

PeerPoint Medical Education Institute has reorganized as an independent company no longer tied to MedPoint Communications.

Grantees must disclose financial interest in companies relevant to research

Researchers receiving grants from the National Institutes of Health would face tougher disclosure rules under an amendment to the economic stimulus bill introduced by Sens. ...

Professional Media

HealthCentral acquires Wellsphere

HealthCentral has acquired Wellsphere, a health and wellness information and technology firm.

Slack adds director of e-publishing

Slack Inc., a healthcare publisher, has promoted Evan Young to the newly created position of director, e-publishing for specialty medicine.

Sage launches Emotion Review

Sage has launched Emotion Review, a quarterly journal published in association with the International Society for Research on Emotion.

Quadrant's Emergency Medicine celebrates 40th anniversary

Quadrant HealthCom's Emergency Medicine is celebrating the 40th anniversary of its publication with new content and a new design.

McGraw-Hill Professional partners with JAMA to launch JAMAevidence

McGraw-Hill Professional has partnered with the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) to develop and launch JAMAevidence, a learning tool and digital resource for ...

Journal of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network gets new publisher

The Journal of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network has announced the appointment of Cold Spring Publishing as its new publisher.

Media Forum

Media buying is a question of scale

As online media scales to television-sized buys, how will marketers find enough relevant, valuable health consumers beyond the usual condition-specific pages?

Direct Marketing

Publicis revamps messaging group

In an effort to consolidate its messaging group, Publicis Healthcare Communications Group will form a new messaging group that will be helmed by Rick Keefer.

TargetRx launches the FieldPerformanceAdvantage tool

TargetRx unveiled FieldPerformanceAdvantage, an industry tool designed to help pharmaceutical and biotech companies understand how in-field sales and marketing initiatives are actually performing at driving ...

Best Practices unveils benchmark data from biopharma leaders

Best Practices unveiled "Benchmarks for Optimizing Marketing Staff Levels to Drive Growth."

Wolters Kluwer Health, Bristol-Myers Squibb enter into contract

Wolters Kluwer Health joined forces with Bristol-Myers Squibb in a multi-year contract.

Eli Lilly teams up with Denver Broncos for diabetes campaign

Eli Lilly teamed up with Denver Broncos quarterback Jay Cutler who is reaching out to help send children with diabetes to summer camps.

Sanofi-Aventis launches Community Health Partnership in Memphis

Sanofi-Aventis launched its Community Health Partnership (CHP), It's In Our Hands, in the Memphis area, seeking to link African American residents with local healthcare professionals ...

DTC Report

McGarryBowen lands consumer advertising business for Chantix

Pfizer moved the consumer advertising business for Chantix to McGarryBowen, ending McCann HumanCare's contract on the smoking cessation drug.

Social media renders commercial model obsolete: panel

To leverage social media effectively, the drug industry will have to transform its commercial model, said panelists at the ePharma Summit.

Nissen comments on DDMAC's needs to restrict DTC

Steven Nissen, head of cardiovascular medicine at Cleveland Clinic, wrote in the journal Nature that DDMAC "needs the right to restrict direct-to-consumer advertising during the ...

Bausch & Lomb launches campaign for Crystalens for cataracts

Bausch & Lomb launched a targeted ad campaign aimed at seniors for its new Crystalens intraocular lens for cataracts.

Omnicom Group reports income down 13.7% in Q4

Demonstrating just how badly mainline agencies are suffering from the recession, Omnicom Group reported that Q4 net income was down 13.7% to $271 million from ...

Digital Media

Web Watch: Interactive video advertising will become the standard

Someday we'll look back at the early days of the Internet and realize that banner ads were the Internet's training wheels before interactive video advertising ...

Study: Lantus website tops in consumer satisfaction

The product site for Sanofi-Aventis's insulin injection Lantus received the highest mark in terms of consumer satisfaction, according to a Manhattan Research study.

Healthline extends network's reach

Health information network Healthline has extended it reach through new partnerships with AOL Health, dLife, iVillage, Organized Wisdom, Tudiabetes.com and WrongDiagnosis.com.

Public Relations

PR View by Susan Isenberg

In today's trust-bereft marketplace, it's engagement that people crave, and engagement that builds trust.

MS&L appoints Peter Harris, Renee Wilson as new directors

MS&L has appointed Peter Harris to director of its corporate practice in North America, and Renee Wilson to managing director of its New York office.

Media Mind surveys best to work for

Media Mind just completed its annual survey of healthcare journalists, tallying their thoughts and views on pharmaceutical companies, insurers, agencies, and medical centers.

Marketing Research

Vantage Point

As my associates and I have studied health care behavior over the decades, we have observed several trends that are now changing substantially.

CMI launches a new brand platform, website

Full-service marketing research firm CMI has launched a new brand platform that focuses on the company's ability to impact clients' business.

SK&A announces two associate vice president promotions

SK&A announced the promotion of Tim Powell to associate vice president of sales, and Veronica Eggers to associate VP of customer service.

Washington Insider

As I see it

The Obama administration's flurry of "change" announcements included apparent backsliding on his spectacularly successful election campaign's "no lobbyists in my administration" pledge.

Reviewers: 'longstanding corruption' at the FDA

Echoing earlier complaints by drug reviewers, now medical device reviewers at the FDA have begun complaining to Capitol Hill and the Obama Administration about allegedly ...

FDA not tracking investigator financial interests

The HHS Office of Inspector General (OIG) says the FDA can't determine whether clinical trial sponsors have submitted financial information for all clinical investigators due ...

FDA approve over 100 drugs in 2008

The FDA's drug safety director, Gerald Dal Pan, has given an update on progress to date, including a tally of 34 new postmarket studies or ...

Neurontin whistleblower case reveals off-label promo

Two University of California San Francisco medical school professors who were unpaid consultants to plaintiffs in a Neurontin whistleblower marketing case reported in January that ...

Back Talk

The dilemma of the pens

As of the first of the year the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA code) forbade the distribution of such goodies as pens or ...