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Modern technologies are spread in all spheres of our lives. They make many routine processes easier, quicker, and more effective. Medicine is not an exception. There are already many healthcare programs, apps, and wearable devices that let to control the patients more accurately and 24-7. All of these technologies that are used in medicine also have storage where the data is recorded and saved. It is a kind of modern medical history. These programs reduce all papers and the number of possible errors – with defining diagnosis or taking clinical drugs.
There are already examples of systems that take control of every patient. One of them is the Clinical Decision Support System that helps to make accurate decisions by doctors or nurses. For detailed information about this modern clinical system, read the article on our blog.
Usage of API
API helps to integrate or connect two independent systems for one goal. There are already a lot of computer scanners and diagnostics available in medical facilities. Usually, all results of these procedures, like CPD or MRI, are printed on papers, and the copies are saved in archives or in your medical history. So these documents are very easy to lose or mixed up, and the cost of this loss is human health or even life. Also, the treatment and taking clinical drugs must be under control all the time.
The problem that doctors and patients can face is the absence of drug data. What does this clinical data give? Big Pharma companies that produce medications send all of them to the FDA ( Food and Drug Administration) for approval. It lasts more or less 6 months. Then all approved and checked meds are sent to DailyMed – public storage. DailyMed is considered to be an official FDA provider of medicine, it has the main role – provide label info of every pill. All this data goes to computer systems into medical establishments. So FDA provides standards for medications for the only database as pharmacies and vendors tend to take different variants of meds` labels. So this data system with medication naming has to be integrated with hospitals` existing systems to exchange the latest info.
The first question that comes up to your mind – how to do it accurately and quickly? Choosing the right API is a key step to the integration with your system.
There are already bright examples of medicine and clinical drugs data APIs, and we will describe some of them below:
#1 RxNorm
It is the system that contains up-to-date information about all medications on the U.S. market. It can be used for the whole medical facility as well as for every patient’s health recorder. Its main option is differing types of drug concepts – dose, ingredients approved by the FDA. RxNorm receives info from multiple sources and structures it by definite groups with standard names. It gets a unique code RxCUI for the process of structuring.
#2 Adverse Event Reporting System
The reports of this system show the reaction to drug products of a definite patient. The API that is used in this system gives the ability to filter cases with general information like age, weight, level of activity, gender, and so on. This report will show all cases connected to this drug product – age and place of living of patients, reactions, dates, etc.
#3 DailyMed
DailyMed API returns SPL information in XML and JSON formats. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through the National Library of Medicine, provides users with access to current Structured Product Language (SPL) of public drugs – NDA numbers, codes, names, ingredient identifiers.
#4 OpenFDA
It is a public governmental system for medical device data. The APIs show results in JSON. OpenFDA uses the brand name and universal product code for accurate API search and understanding.
#5 Goodrx
Goodrx has got 5 public APIs for returning data of drugs, It can be filtered by lower and higher prices, price comparison, top list of suggestions on drug requirements match.
Custom API options
Besides public drug APIs, tech providers have solutions for local sources. They develop customized APIs that have access to drug data in a definite area. What are the functions that custom API can give? Here are some of the main:
- Drug images and imprints;
- Drug dosing info specific to patient parameters and conditions, route of administration, indication, dose type, etc., dosing recommendations;
- Drug-drug and drug-food interactions, indications, and side effects;
- returns the maximum reasonable price for a given drug at a local pharmacy;
- Autocomplete search for drug products by drug ingredient name;
- The adverse effects are collected from clinical trial data, drug labels, and post-market reporting.
Using the medicine data API reduces the probability of many errors that can cause serious problems with patients` health. It is not a seldom case of mixing up the recipes and clinical drugs because of similar labels, for example. Yous custom API connects your local system to an approved public drug data and can contain any option you want that we count a paragraph earlier in this article. Medicine data API helps to create a general structured system for your medical facility. What is more, it gives a higher level of security and safety, as it is not only storage for drug product names but it can also a system that gathers and saves private info about patients, their meds, doses for transparency.
FAQ
Conclusion
Taking everything into account, if you are a Dean of Medicine or have any influence in the medical facility you work in, pay attention to this article and the importance of customized API for your local system. In today`s world, it is impossible to keep all information about all patients in mind or on papers. The probability of errors and the price the patient can pay is too high to ignore this software. All patients want to feel safe and be well-cured. Custom Medicine API guarantees reliable treatment and personal care for your customer. Don`t hesitate and contact our developers` team for a detailed consultation.
