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States consider ban on data mining

Pharma Compliance Alert, August 27, 2008

As many as 18 states are considering laws that would prohibit companies from collecting prescription data and selling it to pharmaceutical companies, according to an Arizona Republic article.

Data mining allows pharmaceutical companies to target physicians based on their prescribing habits. Physicians don’t always know when pharmaceutical companies have access to the data, according to the article.

The push to ban data mining is not new. New Hampshire, Maine, and Vermont all passed laws banning data mining, but judges ruled the New Hampshire and Maine laws unconstitutional. The 1st U.S. Circuit Court heard an appeal of New Hampshire’s case earlier this year and is expected to announce a decision this month. Vermont delayed implementing its law until 2009.

California tried to take the opposite approach. The California Senate in June passed a bill that would allow pharmacies to sell patient prescription information to third-party businesses, but the bill failed to earn a single vote in the State Assembly’s Committee on Health.

The revised PhRMA Code on Interactions with Healthcare Professionals also tackles the subject. According to the Code, pharmaceutical companies may use non-identified patient data to:

• Provide important safety and risk information to prescribers
• Conduct research
• Track adverse events
• Focus marketing activities to prescribers who would most likely benefit from information about a particular product

The information must not identify individual patients. Also, companies should honor a physician’s wish that the prescribing data not be shared with sales representatives.

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