Why aren't you taking your drugs? The age old question is getting new treatment at an upcoming summit of health care professionals, pharmaceutical manufacturers, patients and advocates. On Feb. 24,
Wool.labs Cocktail Convention offers a group with often diverging opinions the chance to duke it out over a beer.
The event, Patient Adherence Through the Lens of Social Media in the Healthcare Continuum, will be held at the National Constitution Center, and is co-sponsored by
Wool.labs,
SmartBrief, and
MISI Company. Proceeds from ticket sales benefit the Prostate Cancer Foundation.
Michele Bennett is Wool.labs' COO and the moderator of the event, which, she says, is Wool.labs' way "of trying to promote more understanding in patient health care." She says the evening will begin with panelists from a wide range of perspectives, including the dynamic entrepreneur Paul Shiels, managing director of the
Ansley Capital Group and a big proponent of using social media to both gather and spread information about health care. He cites Wool.labs'
research into what people were saying online about Avandia well before the diabetes drug made headlines for increasing the risk of heart attack.
"It's startling, the level of sophistication that is discernible early on," says Shiels, who adds that Wool.labs' proprietary search engine is better than a focus group or survey based analysis, because it doesn't just go to medical pages, but instead searches every available website in the world to glean information on the relationship between patients and their medications. In fact, he says, quite a bit of Avandia chat was found on a forum for motorcycle enthusiasts.
Joining Shiels on the panel is Dan Zenka, Vice President of Communications for the
Prostate Cancer Foundation. In what Zenka terms a "hugely ironic" turn of events, he himself was diagnosed with prostate cancer nearly a year ago, and immediately created the blog
My New York Minute, a chronicle of his diagnosis and treatment. The site has racked up 24,000 reads since the first post in April 2010. Other guests include pharmacist Steve Basiago, oncologist Tim Showalter, and health care administrator Elizabeth Beer. Moderator Michele Bennett promises a thought provoking evening and maybe even some controversy.
Source: Michele Bennett, Wool.labs, Paul Shiels, Ansley Capital Group, Dan Zenka, Prostate Cancer Foundation
Writer: Sue Spolan