Impactiviti Daily 061510 Top Pharma News

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TODAY’S NEWS:

Cheap drug could be a life-saver – A cheap drug that can stop bleeding in recently injured accident patients could potentially save the lives of tens of thousands worldwide, a new study says. Researchers studied the effects of tranexamic acid, or TXA, in more than 10,000 adult trauma patients in 40 countries who received the drug within 8 hours of being injured. They compared those patients’ outcomes to more than 10,000 accident victims who got a placebo treatment. The study was published online Tuesday in the medical journal Lancet…more

Pfizer ends development of one experimental RA drug from Trubion; keeps another one going.

Glaxo gets FDA OK for combo prostate treatment.

Human Genome Sciences: low expectations for Hepatitis C drug approval.

Judge to Abbott: Pay reps overtime.

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PLUS

Fresh updates to the astonishingly helpful Dose of Digital Social Media (Pharma/Healthcare) Wiki. And, a little thought-provoking tidbit: The Red Pill or the Blue Pill?

JUST FOR FUN

Nature’s Patterns in Photography. Sheer eye candy.

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Impactiviti Daily 052110 Top Pharma News

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TODAY’S NEWS:

Abbott making a big India buy – The speculation that has been fuelling the shares of Piramal Healthcare over the past few days has been put to rest after Abbott Laboratories announced Friday that it will buy a unit of the Indian pharmaceutical company…more

Lots of Oncology. Rituxan: cutting lymphoma recurrence – The final phase of a drug study finds that two years of treatment with rituximab (Rituxan) cuts in half the risk that follicular lymphoma patients who respond to chemotherapy will suffer a recurrence of the disease…more And, some good news on sarcoma: An experimental drug from Ziopharm Oncology Inc. helped keep fast-growing sarcomas, lethal tumors that can grow to the size of basketballs, in check 77% longer than a standard treatment, a company-sponsored study found…more Plus, Amgen experimental drugs slow down some tumors.

Some side effects of popular cholesterol-lowering drugs? – Drugs to lower cholesterol and prevent heart disease, taken by millions of people worldwide, increase the risk of cataracts, kidney failure, muscle pain and liver dysfunction, a study of more than 2 million Britons found…more

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PLUS

The Doctor Won’t See You Now training.

JUST FOR FUN

It’s spring, and the weather’s fine. So, go on one of America’s Scenic Drives.

AND, a pharma spoof – So, What’s your Problem with Gram-Negative Bacteria?

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Impactiviti Daily 040710

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TODAY’S NEWS

Abbott Labs: Minus 175 – Abbott laid off approximately 175 sales reps in the US, Dow Jones reported yesterday. The company “shifted resources” within its US pharma business, and layoffs were not related to a specific brand…more

AstraZeneca and a winning strategy to get lawsuits dismissed (Seroquel tie to diabetes) – The drugmaker has used a similar strategy — questioning expert witness’ qualifications and whether plaintiffs have strong evidence that Seroquel caused their diabetes — to get numerous other lawsuits over the drug dismissed….more

FDA, Forest Labs, and Daxas for COPD – could be rough ride.

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PLUS

What does a sunrise in Virginia Beach look like? This, perhaps!

JUST FOR FUN

30 Ethereal Examples of Smoke Photography. Pretty sweet.

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Impactiviti Daily 031510

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TODAY’S NEWS

TriCor = placebo? Not good news for Abbott – A popular triglyceride-lowering drug that has been taken by millions of Americans failed to prevent heart disease in a big federal study being presented today…more

FDA to Eli Lilly/Amylin on once-weekly Byetta: No.

OSI to Astellas: No.

FDA to Plavix (from BMS and Sanofi): black-box warning.

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PLUS

You’ve heard all about reach and frequency. How about each and recently? And, when it comes to Pharma and Social Media: One or Many?

JUST FOR FUN

Dogs filmed at 1,000 frames per second. You’ve never seen dogs jump quite like this before.

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Impactiviti Daily 031110

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TODAY’S NEWS

Forbes: Pfizer‘s history of buying pipeline lemons. This does only tell one side of the story, however – Pfizer has also acquired some pretty major hits.

Speaking of flops, a couple of major experimental drugs aren’t looking so hot these days.

FDA taking another look at some bone drugs, in relation to hip fractures – There have long been safety questions — and lawsuits — over whether bone-building drugs like Merck’s Fosamax can actually increase the chance of femur fractures. Today, the FDA said it was going to take another look at the safety issues…more

Did J&J plan to break the rules with Risperdal? Business Week reports. Plus, Shire gets a “fourfecta” warning letter from the FDA on one marketing promotion.

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Nine Simple Steps to Getting Started in Social Media. Good stuff from Dose of Digital blog. For a practical guide on how YOU (as an individual) can put social networking to use building your own Opportunity Network, download my free e-book on that subject.

JUST FOR FUN

25 photos comparing exact same places in the past and present. Oddly fascinating.

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Impactiviti Daily 031010

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TODAY’S NEWS

Botox heading to an arm near you – The Food and Drug Administration said Tuesday it approved Allergan‘s botulinum-based drug Botox to treat spasms of the elbow, wrist and fingers…more

Abbott to boost pipeline with Facet buy – Abbott says the acquisition will boost its early- and mid-stage pharmaceutical pipeline. The developer has its eyes on two primary therapeutic areas–immunology and oncology. The highest-priority program is daclizumab, a Phase II biologic for multiple sclerosis that will move into Phase III trials in Q2 of 2010. Facet is already partnered with Biogen Idec on the compound. The biotech also has oncology compounds for multiple myeloma and chronic lymphocytic leukemia in early to mid-stage trials…more

FDA panel gives (preliminary) green light to InterMune’s lung drug.

Jury verdict against Novartis for rep who claimed retaliation after taking maternity leave.

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PLUS

More docs using e-Prescribing. Look for this to keep accelerating.

JUST FOR FUN

Eye-catching examples of urban decay photography. More interesting than it sounds!

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Impactiviti Daily 112409

I wish all my readers and pharma-industry colleagues a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday!

TODAY’S NEWS

Cephalon, Ception, and CINQUIL: the stats don’t reach significance, but at least all the names are similar – “We are pleased to see a positive biological effect of CINQUIL,” said Steve Tullman, Chief Executive Officer at Ception Therapeutics. “Conducting clinical studies in a new disease area is always challenging. We will continue to review the data from this study and from our ongoing open-label study to find the best path forward for CINQUIL for the treatment of eosinophilic esophagitis.”…more

Might a few companies (such as Endo or King) be targets to go private? WSJ reports.

Can pharma sales reps be turned into better value creators? A question we’re all thinking about…

Duh.

Oops. Abbott‘s Meridia weight-loss drug associated with higher rate of cardiovascular events – Meridia is a weight-loss drug approved in 1997. As part of its post-approval commitments, Abbott has been conducting a large study of 10,000 patients to determine whether treatment with Meridia could reduce the number of heart-related adverse events compared to a placebo. In mid-November, however, Abbott reported to regulatory agencies that treatment with Meridia was associated with an 11.4% rate of cardiovascular events compared to 10% for patients treated with placebo…more

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PLUS

An update on Pfizer’s Social Media initiatives. Encouraging!

JUST FOR FUN

Changing behavior through fun. The Piano Stairs.

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Impactiviti Daily 111709

Whew! The back-to-back conference marathon is now over, and we can get back to our regular pharma news reporting. Here’s what’s up today…

TODAY’S NEWS

Everyone’s talking about the Zetia/Niaspan study – its results, its significance, its limitations. Bottom line – I can’t see how this can be good for Merck. More here. And Jim Edwards analyzes the damage control spin effort here.

Always a headline topic: female sexual desire treatments. The more you read about this drug (experimental ‘flibanserin’ from Boehringer-Ingelheim), however, the more you wonder if the purported effect will be worth the expense and the side effects.

BMS pushing Mead-Johnson out of the nest. It is amazing to me how drug companies cycle through periods where they diversify, then spin divisions off…

Novartis: half a dose of H1N1 vaccine may be enough. Now that’s how to increase vaccine supply!

If you’re going to blow the whistle, I guess it’s important to get on to the field of play! Whistleblower lawsuit against J&J dismissed.

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Is this drug a frog, or a prince? I dunno, but I like the picture…!

JUST FOR FUN

Dilbert: Who needs training?

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Impactiviti Daily 092809

Now Available – Archived interview on Social Media in Pharma last Friday with Paul Chaney – feel free to forward the link (http://bit.ly/29kAoN) to your colleagues.

TODAY’S NEWS

Abbott wins the bidding for Solvay’s drug unit – Abbott Laboratories will announce today the €5bn ($7.3bn) acquisition of Solvay’s pharmaceutical company, bringing a five-month takeover battle to an end and highlighting continued consolidation in the industry. The US drugmaker beat UCB of Belgium and Nycomed of Switzerland to buy the division, which is valued at between €4.5bn and €5bn…more

The Medicines Company gets encouraging results from Angiomax study – The Medicines Company today announced the presentation of 2-year clinical results from the landmark HORIZONS-AMI Trial. The trial showed that patients who had suffered the most severe form of heart attack were significantly less likely to suffer cardiac death and had better overall survival if treated with Angiomax® (bivalirudin) while undergoing angioplasty compared with those treated with heparin plus a platelet glycoprotein IIb/IIIa inhibitor (GPI) during angioplasty...more

Merck‘s diabetes drug Januvia with pancreatitis link? Merck says no, but FDA concerned.

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PLUS

Is the Apple iPhone 3GS good enough to record the video of an entire conference presentation? Well, yes, it kinda can. Here are the results of my little experiment, from last week’s PharmaMed conference.

Coming up next month:

Oct. 19-21 – eXL’s Digital Pharma conference, Bridgewater, NJ. This event will be quite progressive, with more of an informal “unconference” format to maximize interaction. I’ll be co-leading a pre-conference workshop on the 19th on social media, and live-blogging/Twittering. Here’s a discount code for 15% your registration: P615WOO

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Impactiviti Daily 090409

TODAY’S NEWS

Abbott to acquire Visiogen for $400m…and, also named a top place to start your career.

Meda – Astepro once-daily (for the treatment of the symptoms of seasonal and perennial allergic rhinitis) approved by FDA.

Forest Labs on the hot seat for questionable promotional practices, part 2: ghostwriting budget in 2004. Ouch.

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PLUS

Some nice stuff here – 50 brilliant and creative advertisements to inspire you.

JUST FOR FUN

Are you all kinds of envious of people with skinny thighs? Maybe you shouldn’t be!

Next week will be a “week off” for Impactiviti Daily. I hope all my readers have a wonderful holiday weekend!

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