By Heather Havenstein March 25, 2008
A new electronic health notification network that was unveiled today promises to more quickly notify doctors and hospitals about safety alerts concerning drugs and medical devices. Under the current paper-based system, it can take weeks to notify doctors about safety alerts.
Set to go live in June, the new Health Care Notification Network (HCNN) will use e-mail to notify doctors about safety alerts issued by drug or device manufacturers. Doctors can begin signing up for the service now. The HCNN will also be used as a notification system in the event of a bioterrorism attack or the outbreak of a nationwide epidemic.
The network will replace a system that disseminates alerts via the U.S. Postal Service. The current alerts are known as "Dear Doctor" letters.
"[The current system] is slow and expensive -- often with weeks of delays," said Nancy Dickey, chair of the iHealth Alliance, a not-for-profit organization that will control and govern the HCNN. "It is not uncommon for an alert to be mistaken for marketing and simply be tossed away. It is very difficult to forward the appropriate information to patients."
The free service will be maintained by iHealth Alliance to ensure that no spam or marketing messages will be forwarded to the e-mail addresses provided by physicians, Dickey added. The group's board is made up of officials from medical liability insurance carriers, medical societies and patient advocacy groups, as well as practicing physicians and a liaison from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
The iHealth Alliance said that several thousand physicians have already signed up to use the network, which was formed to adhere to 2006 Food and Drug Administration guidance that suggested that electronic delivery of patient safety alerts is preferable in most cases to paper-based delivery. Dickey noted that 97% of physicians participating in a 2004 survey said they would use such an e-mail network. All of the respondents agreed that patient safety data must be sent in a manner that's more efficient than the mail.
Janet Woodcock chief medical officer of the FDA and director of its Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, said that the network will ensure that doctors "won't be hearing of problems first from the media or from concerned patients."
She said the new network could have helped prevent recent instances of the blood thinning drug Heparin being given in the wrong dosages to several patients because of confusing labels. That occurred despite warnings being issues by the drug's manufacturer about the labels.
"[The HCNN] could have reached into doctors offices immediately with pertinent information," she added.
Dickey added that several medial liability insurance companies, including the nation's largest -- The Doctors Co. -- have signed on to support the new network and are urging the doctors in their networks to sign up for the service. David Troxel medical director of Napa, Calif.-based The Doctors Co. said that the HCNN has the potential to reduce the premiums that doctors pay for liability insurance "because it almost certainly will enhance patient safety."
The company will monitor the project and its results along with electronic health records to evaluate the possible reduction in premiums, he added.