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1. About 70% of patients who use Facebook or Twitter let doctors access those accounts, according to Reuters. Researchers, writing in BMJ Quality and Safety, said that giving social-media access to physicians may help uncover information about health histories and identify behaviors that affect health.
2. The CEO of Turing Pharmaceuticals told an HIV activist that the promised price reduction for Daraprim would be 10%, according to The New York Times. Turing was criticized for raising the price of the antiparasitic drug from $13.50 a tablet to $750 a tablet after it acquired the drug in August.
3. WebMD said the number of unique users rose 8% to 206 million in third quarter of 2015, compared to the same quarter a year ago, reported The Wall Street Journal. Page views also increased, by 11% to 4 billion during the third quarter.
4. Growth of drug spending in a retail setting has slowed in most countries but a combination of aging populations and the high costs of specialty drugs is expected to cause overall spending to rise, according to new data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. New specialty drugs will likely account for 50% or more of drug spending growth over the next five years.
5. Novo Nordisk said it will consider running another clinical study for diabetes drug Victoza depending on the result of a current cardiovascular outcomes trial, according to Reuters. The outcome of the trial has become increasingly important since Eli Lilly and Boehringer Ingelheim reported that their drug Jardiance reduces the risk of death in diabetics with heart risk.
