Use of real-world data important for improving medicine safety

The use of real-world data is key if medicines are to be made safer for patients, delegates at the Drug Safety Research Unit’s (DSRU) international pharmacovigilance conference heard last month.

Figures from across the pharmaceutical industry gathered to discuss how the use of diverse data sets, gathered from sources including big data and social media are being used in clinical use of medicines.

Andrew Bate, senior director, analytics team lead in epidemiology at Pfizer, explained to delegates that ‘rapid, reliable and sustained access to trusted data sources’ were really important to ensure safety of medicines in real world use for patients.

The conference, which took place at the Wellcome Collection in London, focused on three key areas: the potential value of the application of artificial intelligence, the use of observational data sources such as claims data and health service data and mining big data sources such biobanks and social media.

Other speakers included Judith Maro from Harvard Medical School and Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute, Patrick Ryan from Janssen, Jamie Robinson from Astellas Pharma, Francesco Salvo from the University of Bordeaux and Eugène van Puijenbroek from Lareb.

The DSRU has also launched an International Working Group which looks to examine the implications for signal detection within artificial intelligence, genetics and big data by bringing together some of the world's best experts.