FDB unveils FDB Vela e-prescribing network

First Databank, a leading provider of drug knowledge that helps healthcare professionals make precise decisions, is launching FDB Vela, a cloud-native e-prescribing network that the company said enables the seamless flow of critical medication prescription information, benefits verification and clinical decision support between prescribers, payers, pharmacies and other constituents.

“We believe it’s time for a robust and frictionless electronic prescribing connection—one that will open the door to transformative innovations that improve workflows, expand capabilities and foster collaboration,” FDB president Bob Katter, said. “FDB Vela gives stakeholders a new choice when facilitating the billions of electronic prescribing transactions that take place across the country every year.”

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“A majority of prescriptions are currently written and dispensed using FDB’s industry-leading drug knowledge and decision support capabilities, and we view FDB Vela as a natural extension to the services we already provide to the nation’s leading health IT vendors, hospitals, ambulatory clinics, pharmacies, PBMs and health insurance companies,” Katter said.

FDB Vela provides medication eligibility and benefits information for millions of U.S. consumers and supports the current set of e-prescribing transactions required by the National Council for Prescription Drug Programs, the company said.

Participants can access the network on a non-exclusive basis, enjoying the full range of technological and economic benefits for qualifying transactions while continuing to use their existing e-prescribing network for other transactions.

[Read more: Survey: Specialty pharmacists report administrative delays to treatment]  

The company pointed out that through a partnership with RxRevu, a leading real-time cost and coverage network provider, FDB Vela brings real-time pharmacy benefit information to e-prescribing workflows embedded seamlessly within the EHR. This allows clinicians to retrieve important information about prior authorization requirements and a patient’s out-of-pocket responsibility so they can have fully informed conversations about costs and medication choices with their patients.

In partnership with RxLightning, an innovator in specialty prescription enrollment and processing, FDB Vela brings specialty enrollment services directly into the clinician’s ordering workflow, eliminating the current set of overlapping manual transactions.

“Today’s process, conducted via phone and fax, takes an average of 24 days to complete, leaving patients waiting for vital treatments. By automating enrollment and prescription routing for specialty drugs, FDB Vela can help save staff hours each week and dramatically reduce fulfillment wait times for patients,” the company said.