Last week Pixels & Pills’ editor Briana Campbell had the pleasure of sitting down for a Skype chat (so the quality is a little lower than our normal, professional videos) with Dr. Darshan Kulkarni (@FDALawyers) of the Kulkarni Law Firm in Philadelphia. And while the questions answered in the conversation don’t constitute legal advice and should not be constructed as such, we were very happy to get the thoughts of a lawyer on the recent FDA draft guidance. And to have him address some questions that you all had put forth on Twitter.

Further information on some of the things Darshan touches on can be found in the following sources:

The Park Doctrine

Par Pharmaceutical versus the FDA

FDA’s Cease and Desist to Triple Flu Defense

One more time, Jonathan Richman’s handy flow chart

He also mentioned to us, after we’d turend the camera off, that the FDA uses draft guidance as a way to express their thoughts on certain issues without the rigor of regulations. There is much draft guidance out there that never becomes finalized. To us, this means that we should take the guidance for what it is – all we are getting on emerging electronic/social media platforms at this time. And maybe ever.

Do you have questions for Dr. Kulkarni? Thoughts on this conversation? Leave them in the comments and we’ll continue the discourse.

We recently chatted with Paul Simms, Chairman of eyeforpharma, the mastermind behind the ‘Pharmasuiticus reps’ YouTube nature “documentary,” which you may have seen doing the rounds in your social networks.

Pixels&Pills: Why did you decide to make this video?

Paul Simms: We find ourselves quite frustrated with the current situation in pharmaceutical sales management. This is still the area of highest expenditure in medical promotion, and whilst we have seen some movement, there is still a hardcore group resisting the new methods which will ultimately make a great improvement to healthcare at large. This is despite the swathes of industry insiders preaching the need for change. So, to really incite action, we simply went to great lengths to emphasise the ridiculous nature of the once-saturated pharma sales landscape.

P&P: Has it worked?

PS: Depends what you mean.  After a week, there were over 5,000 views without us any real promotion from us, and we’re currently close to 10,000 views, so people are obviously watching and sharing.

Of course, numbers aren’t the point. We hope that it will switch on some light bulbs and make people think about changing their ways of working.  But it’s too early to say whether it has achieved this – ask me again in a year!

P&P: Popular it may be, but some people haven’t liked it, as evidenced by a few detractors on Pharmalot. Do those people have a point?

PS: The main objection seems to be a belief that we are poking fun at the pharma sales rep. And this is a group of people who are going through tough times. There is plenty of fear, diminishing returns and plenty of lay-offs within this group, and we’re kicking them while they’re down.

Laughing at others’ misfortune is certainly not our intention, nor do we want to rub people’s noses in it. The theme of the film was ‘evolution’, not ‘death’: we have used parody in an attempt to reduce or remove the ‘old style’ of rep from the face of the industry and make no apologies for communicating that in the most effective way we can think of. There are now plenty of examples of where a more mature focus on the differing types of customer and an individual level of communication has created great returns – for both the pharma company and patient. The changes within healthcare systems across the world provide an unprecedented opportunity to improve communication and rid this industry of its terrible reputation. But action, not sympathy, is required in order to make that happen.

P&P: What’s next for eyeforpharma?

PS: Well, connected to this film is the 10^th anniversary of our annual flagship event in Barcelona. This time we’re co-locating our eMarketing event with it, so we’ll have more than a thousand people in one space.

It’s interesting to me that whenever we’ve mentioned to the sales community that we’re bringing the online marketers to the same venue, they’ve welcomed this with open arms.

However, the opposite has been true of the online community. Their reaction has been either sheer ambivalence or more of a ‘what, those guys? What have they got to offer?’

For us, it’s clear that progress will only happen when both groups understand how to work together. And we’ve still got a fair bit of work to do in order to answer the question: ‘with 1000 pharma executives in one place, what together can we achieve?’ That’s the opportunity we have. Indeed, e would welcome input from anyone out there as to how to get the most out of this unique gathering. We may even let you take control!

Apart from that, we have a lot more initiatives in the pipeline. Some of them are even quite serious – for example we are currently running a mobile health competition which will really improve the lives of teenage cancer patients. It has backing from Livestrong and 9 other charities and we’re very excited about that.

P&P: And tell us… What will your next acting gig be?

PS: Hopefully none for a while! I hadn’t even intended to be in this one; clearly the camera crew decided I was the most Neanderthal-like and simply had to play the ‘alpha rep’. I guess it’s praise of a sort.

We had to include this powerful interview in our Year In Review. From E-Patient Connections 2011, renowned Soprano, Charity Tilleman-Dick shares her inspiring story with Pixels and Pills.

If you’ve seen it already, it’s definitely worth watching again.

We’re getting ready to bring you all the SXSH and ePatCon coverage that you’ve been waiting for!

Until tomorrow, take a look at our YouTube channel and think back to last year’s great conference.

by Jason Brandt (@jasondmg3)

Daniel Kraft of Singularity University gave a TED Talk earlier this year on the future of digital health, in which he explained how “leveraging cross-disciplinary exponentially growing technologies was affecting the future of health and wellness”. It’s a rapid-fire, brilliant, fast-paced 18 minutes and 22 seconds worth checking out, but we wanted to pull out of couple of points.

The challenges of cost and aging. He correctly pointed out that two of the major challenges healthcare faces are skyrocketing costs and the rapidly aging population. Kraft notes that we spend most of our money on the last 20% of life. It’s our responsibility to help ourselves and healthcare professionals to shift that, to put all that time and effort – and less money – toward preventing disease before it ever happens.

The opportunities of small. He’s particularly passionate about the potential of smartphones, and how much computing power they put in each of our pockets. Furthermore, he notes, the shrinking of technology enables it not only to be hand-held like a smartphone, but tiny in terms of swallowable pills and informative contact lenses, virtual colonoscopies and scarless surgery done using robots and cameras slipped down the digestive tract.

The new paradigm ahead. He refers to P4 medicine – the ability of nascent technology to help us create healthcare that is predictive, preventative, personalized and participatory. And in the oncology jargon of his field, Kraft is looking forward to Stage Zero medicine – catching disease not even at its earliest stages (Stage I as opposed to Stage II, III or IV), but before it even has a chance to happen. As he says, “As a cancer doctor, I’m looking forward to being out of a job.”

The real purpose. Kraft points out that augmenting patient care with digital technology is, yes, very cool, but its importance lies in its ability to better diagnose, to earlier diagnose, and to leave more time for actual patient care. We sometimes focus too much on the technological capabilities and forget that technology can’t offer human empathy. Our purpose – the purpose of everyone who does anything in the healthcare industry – should be to help keep people from getting sick in the first place, and truly taking care of the people who do still fall ill. The technology is there to make that possible.

What projects are you working on that answer these challenges?