FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE - January 8, 2009
PharmaSURVEYOR launches
the most advanced drug safety utility
Combinatorial risk assessment and resolution
well beyond interaction checking
Las Vegas, January 8, 2009 - PharmaSURVEYOR (www.pharmasurveyor.com), a Silicon Valley healthcare informatics startup, demonstrated the next step in drug safety technology for consumers and clinicians at the CES Silvers Summit.
PharmaSURVEYOR is a web application that provides a dramatic leap beyond drug interaction checkers - identifying, diagnosing and resolving Adverse Drug Effect (ADE) risks. This free utility allows consumers and clinicians to identify symptoms that may in fact be Side Effects, diagnose which meds are more likely responsible for the adverse effects plaguing the patient and find substitute medications that reduce risk. PharmaSURVEYOR is the only technology that goes beyond interaction checking to help reveal and reduce combined risks - the risks that add up across the drugs in a regimen even in the absence of chemical interactions. Combined risks were responsible for the deaths of celebrities Heath Ledger, Anna Nicole and Daniel Smith whose drugs did not interact yet combined to lethal effect. While celebrity fatalities are the most visible, Side Effects are responsible for one in ten deaths in the US - which amounts to 4,000 fatalities every week - and have been estimated to cost the US economy $177 Billion annually. PharmaSURVEYOR is actively addressing this crisis with its patent-pending technology for combinatorial risk assessment and resolution.
"Drug interaction checkers only flag interaction problems, not combined risks, and they don't help to resolve any problems; PharmaSURVEYOR does!" said Erick Von Schweber, Executive Co-Chair of PharmaSURVEYOR. The PharmaSURVEYOR web application not only offers a more comprehensive assessment of risk than do checkers but goes beyond the flagging of risks to helping the consumer and clinician identify substitute meds that reduce the risk of the patient's adverse effects. "PharmaSURVEYOR allows the user to perform "what-if" analyses, similar to using a spreadsheet, to evaluate the safety impact of changes to a drug regimen."
"Drug safety has become critical for America's boomer and senior populations" continued Mr. Von Schweber. "The typical 45 year old male is on 4 prescription meds which increase to 8-10 by age 65, making it impossible to manage drug toxicities and risks without advanced technology."
In addition to making its advanced safety technology directly available via its web site, the company is also enabling its business partners to integrate the power of the PharmaSURVEYOR utility within a partner's site or application. "Healthcare web sites that presently offer interaction checkers can upgrade their site's functionality by integrating securely with PharmaSURVEYOR using RESTful web services" said Mr. Von Schweber. "PharmaSURVEYOR recently demonstrated this kind of service integration with its collaborator DestinationRx at the Health 2.0 Conference in October 2008. We showed how a user on PharmaSURVEYOR could link to their DestinationRx account with a few clicks and automatically retrieve their med list and generate a Survey of their meds. We invite other companies and organizations with patient records, such as EMRs, EHRs and PHRS, to partner with us to provide their users with the most advanced safety." Companies and organizations supporting Medication Therapy Management and Medication Reconciliation can similarly integrate with PharmaSURVEYOR to enhance the value of their solutions.
Contacts
Linda Von Schweber
PharmaSURVEYOR
(877) 797-8783 x102
linda@pharmasurveyor.com
www.pharmasurveyor.com