Swedish, Dutch Firms' Clinical Data Alliance

Minidoc of Sweden and the Dutch 1st Line Medical group have signed an agreement to merge their systems for collecting data from patients and doctors in drug trials.

The Minidoc product is an electronic patient diary programmed with questions on the medication. An in-built alarm signal indicates that it is time to answer questions on drug effects which, says Minidoc, increases the reliability of the trials. The Dutch Quest product is a similar paperless system, but is adapted for comments from doctors and project leaders. The firms say that together, their systems cover "a whole chain of people involved in a drug trial," and that the agreement "could save manufacturers $5 million a week."