{"id":10302,"date":"2020-04-15T09:23:45","date_gmt":"2020-04-15T09:23:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/eurekainfomed.it\/?p=10302"},"modified":"2026-07-13T09:26:36","modified_gmt":"2026-07-13T09:26:36","slug":"pharmacovigilance-and-social-media-recommendations-from-the-web-radr-project","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eurekainfomed.it\/en\/pharmacovigilance-and-social-media-recommendations-from-the-web-radr-project\/","title":{"rendered":"Pharmacovigilance and social media: recommendations from the WEB-RADR project"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Over the past few years, the WEB-RADR (<em>Recognising Adverse Drug Reactions<\/em>) project, part of the European Union\u2019s <em>Innovative Medicines Initiative<\/em>, has investigated the <strong>role and usefulness of social media in pharmacovigilance<\/strong>, evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of this emerging data source, the effectiveness of existing analytical algorithms, and potential areas for improvement.<\/p>\n<p>At the conclusion of the project, <strong>experts developed a series of recommendations<\/strong> to help guide the future use of social media in pharmacovigilance.<\/p>\n<h4><em>Which social media platforms should be used?<\/em><\/h4>\n<p>Although previous studies have suggested that data from social media may be more informative than spontaneous adverse drug reaction (ADR) reporting, the WEB-RADR researchers concluded that <strong>the value of social media platforms should be assessed on a case-by-case basis<\/strong>, according to the relative richness of information on medicinal products and safety issues compared with the overall volume of available data.<\/p>\n<p>Common social media platforms such as <em>Facebook<\/em> and <em>Twitter<\/em> appear to be <strong>of limited value for identifying new pharmacovigilance signals<\/strong>. Despite generating large amounts of data, the quality and informational value of individual posts tend to be relatively low.<\/p>\n<p>In addition, the predictive ability of these networks\u2014that is, their <strong>capacity to identify emerging safety concerns early<\/strong> or reveal new aspects of already known issues\u2014has proven to be <strong>very limited<\/strong>. Consequently, they are often resource-intensive while providing limited benefits in the context of <em>signal detection<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>For the identification of new safety signals, the authors recommend using <strong>more specialized social media platforms<\/strong> and <strong>prospectively identifying those best suited for specific objectives<\/strong>, based on the absolute and relative number of posts concerning particular medicines or events of interest.<\/p>\n<p>Examples of platforms considered more useful for <em>signal detection<\/em> include <strong><em>Patient Forums<\/em><\/strong>, which offer dedicated sections for specific diseases, medicines, or patient populations, and <strong><em>Reddit<\/em><\/strong>, whose \u201csubreddits\u201d provide discussion forums focused on highly specific topics.<\/p>\n<h4><em>Where should future research focus?<\/em><\/h4>\n<p>Despite their limited usefulness for identifying ADRs, social media platforms may be particularly valuable for <strong>redefining or reassessing already known adverse reactions<\/strong>, especially regarding their <strong>impact on quality of life<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>According to WEB-RADR, 12% of the analyzed posts contained information related to quality-of-life issues\u2014such as sleep disturbances, anxiety, depression, and similar conditions\u2014which can be extremely valuable, particularly in the neuropsychiatric field.<\/p>\n<p>Another promising area involves <strong>specialized or niche topics<\/strong>, such as <strong>medicine use during pregnancy<\/strong> and cases of <strong>drug misuse or abuse<\/strong>, where combining traditional pharmacovigilance methods with social media data may genuinely improve signal detection.<\/p>\n<p>Future research should therefore focus on <strong>improving predictive algorithms<\/strong> in order to enhance signal identification capabilities, reduce duplication and ambiguity, increase efficiency, and, where possible, lower the costs associated with these technologies.<\/p>\n<p><em>Toward a more comprehensive and coordinated pharmacovigilance system<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The use of social media is part of a broader <strong>transformation of pharmacovigilance<\/strong>, which is evolving from the simple identification and description of adverse events to a <strong>more holistic evaluation of a medicine\u2019s overall benefit-risk profile<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Going forward, it will be necessary to better define the strengths and limitations of the internet as a source of safety information, coordinate and maximize research efforts, and above all <strong>create a collaborative environment involving multiple stakeholders<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Such collaboration is essential for advancing this field of research and supporting the development and adoption of new approaches to pharmacovigilance.<\/p>\n<p><strong>SOURCE<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/31446567\">van Stekelenborg J1, Ellenius J2, Maskell S3,4,. Recommendations for the Use of Social Media in Pharmacovigilance: Lessons from IMI WEB-RADR. Drug Saf.\u00a02019 Dec;42(12):1393-1407. doi: 10.1007\/s40264-019-00858-7.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Over the past few years, the WEB-RADR (Recognising Adverse Drug Reactions) project, part of the European Union\u2019s Innovative Medicines Initiative, has investigated the role and usefulness of social media in&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":10304,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,4,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10302","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pharmacovigilance","category-news","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Pharmacovigilance and social media<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Pharmacovigilance and social media: 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