Can Social Media Tracking Make Medication Safer?

The Food and Drug Administration is investigating how valuable social media posts -- complaints about a certain drug’s side effects, for instance -- could be used in the regulatory process. On Sept 11, the FDA held a public workshop to discuss the possible uses for social media in assessing product safety, but noted that questions about the posters’ expectations of privacy have not been resolved.

Henry Francis, FDA’s ‎deputy director of the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, said that posts on sites, including Twitter and Facebook, are useful for tracking “big, bad and sudden” health-related phenomena. If online mentions of a certain drug or symptom suddenly spike, it likely requires further investigation, he said. These posts, when combined with geolocation data, could help governments respond to disease outbreaks or instances of tainted drugs.