Phase Forward (NASDAQ: PFWD), a leading provider of data management
solutions for clinical trials and drug safety, today announced a
contract award to support the FDA’s production rollout of the company’s
WebSDM™ Release 3.0 software, including the Empirica™ Study Clinical
Trials Signal Detection system. The WebSDM tool was originally developed
under a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) for the
FDA to validate and review submission data in CDISC Study Data
Tabulation Model (SDTM) format, and has been installed at FDA since
2005. Empirica Study provides advanced statistical screening and
visualization tools for review of SDTM data.
Under the contract, Phase Forward will be providing extended support,
training, expanded statistical documentation for reviewers, software
updates and enhancements to the Center for Drug Evaluation and
Research’s (CDER’s) Computational Science Center (CSC) as it works to
make standards-based review tools such as WebSDM more readily available
to reviewers. The WebSDM solution is also installed at the National
Cancer Institute (NCI) for use with the FDA’s Janus data warehouse.
"We’re very pleased to have this opportunity to help CDER expand
reviewers’ use of WebSDM to help them more fully realize the benefits of
standardized submission data in CDISC format,” said Wayne Kubick, vice
president for Phase Forward’s Lincoln Safety Group and Lincoln’s
principal investigator for the original CRADA. "Over the past year, we
have seen increased interest among reviewers in using Empirica Study’s
advanced signal detection capabilities, including Multivariate Bayesian
Logistic Regression and its rich set of graphical visualizations with
drilldown to facilitate exploration of lab, ECG, vital signs, completion
and adverse event data. This new contract will allow us to help
reviewers further capitalize on the wider signal detection and analysis
capabilities that these products can offer.”
WebSDM, along with the Empirica™ suite of pharmacovigilance and risk
management products, is managed by Phase Forward’s Lincoln Safety Group,
one of the most experienced and respected teams in the industry.
About Phase Forward
Phase Forward is a leading provider of integrated data management
solutions for clinical trials and drug safety. Phase Forward’s products
and services have been utilized in over 10,000 clinical trials involving
more than 1,000,000 clinical trial study participants at over 300
organizations and regulatory agencies worldwide including: AstraZeneca,
Boston Scientific, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Eli Lilly, the U.S.
Food and Drug Administration, GlaxoSmithKline, Harvard Clinical Research
Institute, Merck Serono, Novartis, Novo Nordisk, PAREXEL International,
Procter & Gamble, Quintiles, sanofi-aventis, Schering-Plough Research
Institute, Servier, SGS, Tibotec and the U.K. Medicines and Healthcare
Products Regulatory Agency. Additional information about Phase Forward
is available at www.phaseforward.com.
Cautionary Statement
Certain statements made in this press release that are not based on
historical information are forward-looking statements which are made
pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities
Litigation Reform Act of 1995. This press release contains express or
implied forward-looking statements relating to, among other things, the
performance of Phase Forward’s products and services, future business
and operations plans of Phase Forward customers, and future use of Phase
Forward’s products by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). These
statements are neither promises nor guarantees, but are subject to a
variety of risks and uncertainties, many of which are beyond Phase
Forward's control, which could cause actual results to differ materially
from those contemplated in these forward-looking statements. In
particular, the risks and uncertainties include, among other things, the
ability of Phase Forward to collaborate with regulatory agencies,
discontinuation of the use of Phase Forward’s products and services by
customers or regulatory agencies such as the FDA, the possibility that
customers’ and regulatory agencies’ needs or plans may change over time,
and competition. Existing and prospective investors are cautioned not to
place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak
only as of the date hereof. Phase Forward undertakes no obligation to
update or revise the information contained in this press release,
whether as a result of new information, future events or circumstances
or otherwise. For additional disclosure regarding these and other risks
faced by Phase Forward, see the disclosure contained in Phase Forward's
public filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission including,
without limitation, its most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K.