At IQVIA, the purpose of our Real World Evidence (RWE) analytics and services is to provide robust real-world evidence and research for clinicians, policy makers, and other healthcare stakeholders to use in improving the health and well-being of Canadians. Access to quality real-world datasets for research by academia, non-profit organizations, governments, and medical manufacturers provides a better understanding of the patient population, including the ability to evaluate unmet needs, compare costs and effectiveness of treatments, find connections between diseases, and gain new insights to advance patient care. IQVIA’s RWE services are designed to meet these goals and support better-informed healthcare decision-making, in a way that ultimately helps improve health outcomes for all Canadians.
IQVIA provides RWE services and analytics to various healthcare stakeholders including biotech, medical device and pharmaceutical manufacturers, as well as medical researchers, government agencies (including Health Canada), private and public insurers, professional bodies, and patient organizations. However, IQVIA never collects personal information from patient medical records to create its data analytics offerings.
Patient privacy is paramount. In generating analytics for the healthcare community, IQVIA does not collect or receive any personally identifiable patient information, nor does it ever have access to patient medical records. | Real world data is derived from fully anonymized electronic medical records collected from patient management software that is used by general practitioners and select specialists within their community-based offices. Before ever sending us the data, the clinics in question put the |
data through a software based state-of-the-art anonymization process, to produce patient-level RWE data that is appropriate for use in research. That anonymization process goes far beyond simply removing patient-level identifiers, and strictly follows the detailed guidance issued by the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario, as well as all other applicable standards. As such, IQVIA’s real-world analytics are delivered in full compliance with all Canadian legal requirements and to the highest standards of privacy protection. |
IQVIA only sources anonymized RWE data from suppliers who are transparent with patients about their data practices. When sourcing the raw data for these products and services, IQVIA always puts in place express contractual provisions requiring its data suppliers to anonymize the data before it is sent to us, so that it does not identify — directly or indirectly — any individual patient. Furthermore, IQVIA always structures its data supply arrangements so that those arrangements do not contain any incentives, pressures, or means to influence the decisions made by healthcare professionals about how to provide care. IQVIA also regularly obtains arm’s length Re-identification Risk Determinations on its supply of RWE data to ensure that the dataset continues to meet the prevailing standards for anonymization and remains properly risk-mitigated against changes in the technological landscape. Once in-house, the RWE data is also subject to IQVIA’s robust information governance framework, including strict requirements that disallow any use of the data, whether by IQVIA or its clients, for commercial or marketing related purposes.
IQVIA maintains a robust information governance and privacy-by-design model to ensure that its sourcing and use of RWE data complies with all prevailing federal and provincial privacy laws and regulations. | After its anonymization by our data suppliers, the RWE data is transferred to a secure environment at IQVIA where data scientists can perform clinical research studies (RWE studies) and healthcare access and outcomes research on behalf of provider groups, government bodies, and the |
pharmaceutical industry. Whether analyzed by IQVIA or by third party clients and researchers, the data made available for medical and scientific research purposes only, in a manner that prioritizes the improvement of Canadian healthcare, the respect for the professional judgement of healthcare professionals, and the personal autonomy of patients. IQVIA’s RWE data is even made available at no cost to academic researchers such as St-Michael’s Hospital, Université de Montréal, and the University of Toronto, who conduct research to generate insights on: |
Real-world data derived from anonymized medical records can help medical researchers understand many aspects of disease treatment that cannot be understood from regular clinical trials, including intervention decisions/patterns, long-term outcomes, adherence and persistence, rare adverse treatment effects, and interactions with comorbidities/concomitant medications.
Numerous scientific studies are based on anonymized patient-level data. Below are some examples of IQVIA published studies:
Comparing real world management of hypertension in patients with diabetes versus Canadian clinical guidelines
Examples of the research which this data has enabled are available at the following link: rwe-bibliography-brochure_as-of-october-2024.pdf
Learn more about the responsible handling of health information in Canada.