eClinical news in brief
Medidata, Clinphone, Phlexglobal and Octagon Research Solutions.
This week it was announced that Wyeth Pharmaceuticals has elected to exclusively use Medidata's Rave electronic data capture (EDC) system across its company after deciding to stop using its own in-house EDC system. "The deployment of EDC technology has been an extremely important initiative at Wyeth - in the past 11 months, we have increased the rate of EDC usage in trials to more than 90 percent," said Ira Spector, vice president of Clinical Development Operations at Wyeth Research. The firm said it plans to conduct several hundred global studies using Medidata Rave during a seven-year term, with the first trial beginning in the first quarter of 2008. Other new business gains the firm has had of late include a multi-year contract with Copenhagen-based pharmaceutical firm H. Lundbeck to manage more than 10 psychiatric phase II-IV trials, using its latest version of Medidata Rave, version 5.6. Recently, Medidata also announced the commencement of a new partnership with EPS, one of Japan's largest contract research organisations (CRO), who will now incorporate Medidata Rave into their existing offerings. In Japan, rival eclinical firm ClinPhone has also recently inked a deal, this time with Bayer's Japanese arm, Bayer Yakuhin. ClinPhone said it will be Bayer's preferred supplier of randomisation and trial supply management services, specifically using its interactive voice response system (IVRS) for a Japanese phase III trial. Phlexglobal has launched what it calls a "unique" electronic trial master file (TMF) solution - PhlexEview, which it says allows electronic searching and viewing of TMF documentation from sponsors, subsidiaries, CROs and field-based personnel. "Documentation is centralised from the start of a clinical trial and available for viewing from anywhere at anytime, avoiding the common end of study TMF reconciliation difficulties," said the firm. Meanwhile, Octagon Research Solutions has opened a new office in Mountain View, California, in order to establish a West Coast presence and "draw from the strong Silicon Valley talent pool."
