Drug Content

Over the life of the Lexi-Data product Lexicomp has made many key enhancements to help improve the ability of end users, mainly EMRs, to effectively manage drug interactions.  To add to these, recently Lexicomp has released new enhancements surrounding the drug interaction content that allow end users through their EMR to have more information that will allow for better decisions when managing a drug interaction.

New content includes information from the leading interaction reference Lexi-Interact.  Now, via Lexi-Data, content such as Risk Rating, Severity Rating, Onset and Reliability can all be referenced within the Lexi-Data content set.  These new ratings will allow clinicians to see a complete overview of the interaction in question and offer key decision criteria.  Also, included in this new enhancement, is the ability to view a drug interaction on a drug to drug level vs just reviewing the interaction on the class level. This could help clinicians better understand what exceptions within a class are appropriate options to avoid or better manage the interaction.  This content could also help in cutting down on alert fatigue and helping increase the viability of alerts surrounding interactions.  Other pieces of the enhancement offer a summary of the interaction as well as patient management recommendations.

Learn more on these enhancements to help better manage drug interactions or to request more information on Lexi-Data.

Instead of writing out prescriptions on a piece of paper, doctors will perform this function directly into their electronic medical record.  The prescription travels from their computer to the pharmacy’s computer. Electronic prescriptions are sent electronically through a private, secure, and closed network – the Surescripts network.

EMRs, EHRs, and ePrescribers are poised to add controlled substances to their electronic prescribing products -- but there's a hitch. Where can these vendors get the federal and state controlled substance schedules in a ready-to-use format?

Healthcare providers that handle prescriptions in multiple states have long known that the interlocking and overlapping requirements of state and federal controlled substance schedules can be bewildering. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) supplies a federal code that must be followed -- except where it is superceded by more stringent state codes. The result is that every state has different rules for prescribing narcotics and other controlled substances. Even worse, there's no single place to get information from all the states. If you want to keep up, you have to follow each one individually.

Luckily, Lexicomp can now provide both federal and state CSA codes in ready-to-use data formats that make adhering to laws much easier. The information is collected by Lexicomp's in-house staff of content experts and updated regularly. It's available as part of their integrated transactional data product, Lexi-Data, which means the data can power electronic prescribing logic from behind the scenes. Contact Lexicomp today for more information by following the links on this page!

Why I am repeating a headline from last week and some similar content?  Because it seems to resonate with those folks who are making the critical decisions on their EMR development and their need to include the best drug information,  along with the best vendor support. 

As I wrote:

Are you the owner or manager of an ambulatory EMR company?   What keeps you up late at night?   Worried about getting your product to the market as quickly as possible and keeping your costs under control?  Worried about certification?   No doubt you have some thoughts about reducing medical errors by including the best drug information and internal built-in logic.   More and more EMR and EHR  business owners and general managers are turning to Lexicomp to solve their drug information needs.

In a few short years,  Lexicomp has been the fastest growing provider of drug information to the EMR market.  As I said in a previous post:

In addition to supplying the expected information such as drug-drug and drug-allergy interactions,  adverse drug events,  RxNorm mapping,  generic drug lists,  drug nomenclature,  and more.  Lexi-Data offers an incredibly easy to use data structure and API's and most importantly,  Lexicomp is unparalleled in its customer service and providing assistance in the development process. If you are developing a new EMR and need a drug information supplier, make sure that Lexi is on your list.

Healthcare providers have always relied on Lexicomp’s clinical information to provide them with answers to questions about drug interactions. It is important that providers have a trusted resource to find information about the potential, risk, and mechanism of drug and natural product interactions, and methods to manage these risks in their patient’s regimen. The key to Lexicomp’s drug interaction content comes from a strong knowledge base of understanding the pharmacokinetics of drug interactions and a scientific approach to predicting interactions.   Lexicomp’s comprehensive suite of clinical information concerning drug-drug and drug-food interactions is one of the key reasons why EMR vendors use Lexi-Data for clinical decision support to meet Meaningful Use certification requirements.

Lexi-Data’s drug-drug interaction API provides developers many opportunities to customize the display of drug interaction information, offers a severity rating for each interaction, an “advice” header, and a textual description of the significance, nature, and management of the interaction. Lexi-Data also helps manage alert fatigue with the ability to customize interaction alerts for different views. 

Lexicomp will be exhibiting at HIMSS 2012 in Las Vegas from February 20 - 24. Stop by for a visit at Booth #5134 and learn more about the preferred choice of drug information databases!

• Better quality information with faster updates and fewer mistakes

• A more clinically relevant focus that their end users valued

• Easier implementation and more powerful functionality

• Superior customer service

• Unique content not available elsewhere, like Lexicomp’s industry-leading Pediatric Dose Range Checking

Are you developing EMRs and practice management systems where speed to market is critical?   One of the modules of such systems is the inclusion of drug information.    Since this is neither the expertise of your developers nor your content people,  it is important to identify the preferred drug information provider early in the process.   Four criteria are critical in making this decision.   First, quality of information.  Second,  flexibility of design and APIs.   Third, simplicity of data structure.   Fourth, and very important, customer support during the development period and after release.    More and more EMRs are now using Lexicomp drug information as part of their offering.  And there is a reason for that.

Lexi-Data is the foundation of Lexicomp's clinical decision support architecture is quickly becoming the standard for when companies need an up-to-date comprehensive drug database.  This product provides patient specific alerts and referential content to support sound treatment decisions in areas such as drug interaction checking (drug-drug and drug-food), drug allergy checking, therapeutic duplication checking, RxNorm Mappings, supports Surescripts Certification,  Drug Classifications, dose range checking (adult and pediatric), Patient Education, Pediatric and neonatal drug interactions and more. 

1. Meaningful Use support: Including drug-drug and drug-allergy interaction checking
2. Superior customer service: Every customer receives personal service, no matter the size
3. Advanced filtering options: A unique system of complex filters allows users to target Black Boxed Warnings to particular users and circumstances
4. Trusted content and name: Thousands of physicians, pharmacists, nurses, dentists, and other clinicians buy information direct from Lexicomp because they trust it
5. Full support for eprescribing: Customers have used Leicomp's clinical decision support to create their own e-prescribing modules for EMRs and EHRs

One of the most common comments I hear from users of Electronic Medical Records (EMR) systems is associated with “alert fatigue” from unwelcome drug interaction notifications. Many users tell me that they are flooded with unavoidable but unnecessary alerts that interrupt their workflow, decrease productivity, and make the important alerts harder to see. Clinicians find themselves clicking through the alerts as quickly as possible which defeats the purpose of clinical decision support. 

In today's fast-paced healthcare industry, electronic health record (EHR) and other healthcare information system vendors need smart, current drug data that will enable their systems to drive patient safety and improve healthcare -- without generating a flood of annoying alerts that will only be ignored. Lexicomp has recently included new functionality that can alert users with the appropriate Black Box Warning where appropriate in the current workflow. 

In the most simple terms, an FDA Black Box Warning is the strongest warning that the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) puts on a drug. It means that you should pay close attention to the drug's usage because there are some potentially extremely harmful or dangerous threats to your health that the already FDA approved drugs could pose.

The other side of the coin, however, is that an FDA Black Box Warning means that despite the FDA's knowledge of these harmful, serious and sometimes deadly side effects that they are still leaving the FDA approved drug on the market for you to be able to take and potentially experience these harmful side effects. In theory, these FDA Black Box Warnings are designed for both the doctor who is prescribing the drug to be aware of the problems and for you as the consumer to be more aware.

The warning is placed in a prominent 'black box' on the package insert of an FDA approved drug so that people and their doctors can be more aware of it, but few doctors ever see the pill bottles and the vast majority of consumers realistically aren't going to go through the amazingly large amount of technical and medically detailed information on a package insert. This can lead to doctors note being aware of a serious alert which can have serious consequences. With Lexicomp’s inclusions of Black Box Warnings within their medication database, the warnings can be provided to the physician during the prescription process where they are most needed.

• Our Web API solution empowers integration of all Lexicomp content. Consistent API programming calls save time and allow clinicians to launch from their internal applications into our clinical databases, utilizing whatever delivery platform they choose.

• Our Web Services platform is written for compatibility with Microsoft® .NET™ and Java™ programs. XML data can be obtained via standardized calls and is then processed and returned in real-time. Your application will retrieve and parse the content into your display, making complete customization a reality.

• If live Internet calls are not preferred, XML datasets are available for download from an FTP site and incorporated directly into the database.

As it is part of Meaningful Use Stage 1, drug interaction checking is a critical piece.  Not only is it required for reimbursement, but it is also important for improving patient safety.  The difference between content and the quality and depth of the interaction information that you choose to integrate is important to understand.  Many common drug references have an interaction checker where you can manually enter the medications a patient is taking and check for the significance of any interactions.  For clinicians and patient safety this is important; however, when it resides outside of the workflow it can become time consuming.  

A drug interaction list within your system can increase the likelihood that interactions will be checked as it puts these alerts directly into the workflow.  Some of the most important aspects are not the common drug interactions, but the uncommon interactions that are not widely known. Keep in mind that users of your system will most likely want to customize or localize alerts to cut down on the number of insignificant alerts to reduce alert fatigue.  Lexi-Data can help with this as the database is structured to allow for customization, turning off of certain alerts, and is an overall robust interaction checker covering common and less common drug interactions. Lexi-data also allows for drug interaction checking via a web service so there is less IT development time and maintenance.  Contact Lexicomp to request more information on drug interaction lists.