By Mary Kangley 
In October 2019, CREATION Pinpoint® identified 11,607 healthcare professional (HCP) authored tweets (increasing from 10,706 last month), from 5,849 individual HCPs, mentioning a top 50 pharmaceutical company (according to revenue).
October’s Top 50 Pharmaceutical companies mentioned by HCPs on Twitter
| Top 50 rank | Company | Total Mentions | Account mentions | Account retweets | Number of Twitter accounts mentioned |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Johnson & Johnson* | 1792 | 829 | 140 | 21 |
| 2 | Novartis | 938 | 566 | 91 | 14 |
| 3 | GSK | 811 | 337 | 28 | 8 |
| 4 | Sanofi | 751 | 541 | 198 | 20 |
| 5 | Pfizer | 731 | 377 | 70 | 11 |
| 6 | Merck & co | 719 | 349 | 43 | 5 |
| 7 | Vertex | 653 | 647 | 6 | 1 |
| 8 | Bayer | 650 | 204 | 14 | 12 |
| 9 | Roche | 609 | 249 | 87 | 7 |
| 10 | Biogen | 563 | 186 | 17 | 2 |
| 11 | Teva | 536 | 498 | 5 | 6 |
| 12 | Gilead | 488 | 161 | 10 | 2 |
| 13 | AstraZeneca | 409 | 275 | 60 | 5 |
| 14 | Amgen | 324 | 202 | 58 | 10 |
| 15 | Novo Nordisk | 284 | 205 | 7 | 5 |
| 16 | Abbott | 259 | 288 | 18 | 3 |
| 17 | Fresenius | 249 | 203 | 2 | 5 |
| 18 | AbbVie | 249 | 132 | 11 | 7 |
| 19 | Lilly | 218 | 100 | 1 | 6 |
| 20 | Boehringer | 214 | 180 | 50 | 11 |
| 21 | Takeda | 191 | 117 | 31 | 4 |
| 22 | Allergan | 123 | 43 | 2 | 1 |
| 23 | BMS | 102 | 95 | 16 | 4 |
| 24 | Mylan | 93 | 17 | 0 | 2 |
| 25 | Servier | 92 | 15 | 3 | 1 |
| 26 | Merck KGaA | 86 | 73 | 3 | 8 |
| 27 | UCB | 58 | 24 | 7 | 2 |
| 28 | Menarini | 48 | 45 | 3 | 2 |
| 29 | Regenero | 48 | 29 | 5 | 1 |
| 30 | CSL | 43 | 11 | 2 | 1 |
| 31 | Ipsen | 42 | 30 | 14 | 3 |
| 32 | Bausch | 41 | 17 | 0 | 1 |
| 33 | Otsuka | 39 | 23 | 6 | 2 |
| 34 | Astellas | 38 | 25 | 2 | 3 |
| 35 | Celgene | 37 | 29 | 0 | 2 |
| 36 | Eisai | 37 | 21 | 5 | 4 |
| 37 | Alexion | 33 | 14 | 0 | 1 |
| 38 | Mallinckrodt | 33 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| 39 | Daiichi-Sankyo | 27 | 11 | 2 | 2 |
| 40 | Sun | 12 | 5 | 1 | 1 |
| 41 | Grifols | 10 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 42 | Ferring | 8 | 8 | 1 | 1 |
| 43 | Chugai | 4 | 3 | 0 | 1 |
| 44 | Shire** | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 45 | Sumitomo dainippon | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 46 | Sino | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 50 | Endo | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 50 | Mitsubishi tanabe pharma | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 50 | Stada arzneimittel | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 50 | Jiangsu hengrui | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
The five pharmaceutical companies that were mentioned the most were Johnson & Johnson (J&J), Novartis, GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), Sanofi and Pfizer. Both Sanofi and Pfizer are new to the top of this list, but J&J, GSK and Novartis have steadily held their top positions for the three months of this tracking so far.
The top three shared links by HCPs in the month reflected the continually changing landscape; two relating to an unexpected addition for Alzheimer’s treatment.
- A Biogen press release sharing news of their regulatory filing for adacanumab in Alzheimer’s disease.
- An AstraZeneca press release announcing the FDA approval of Farxiga to reduce the risk of heart failure in type 2 diabetes patients.
- A news outlet sharing the “shocking reversal” of Biogen submitting adacanumab for approval.
The top three mentioned corporate accounts saw new additions, as Vertex and Teva took the top two spots. Vertex received a high volume of coverage for two of their cystic fibrosis products; Trikafta which received FDA approval and Orkambi which received approval for access on the NHS. These were celebrated by HCPs as a transformational milestone in cystic fibrosis.
The most shared tweet by HCPs this month was from a mother whose daughter is a cystic fibrosis patient and was surprised by the news of Orkambi’s NHS approval. The emotional video was shared by over 200 HCPs in October. The tweet thanked Vertex and the NHS for the life saving drug.
On a less positive note, HCP mentions of @TevaUSA were driven by the discontinuation of vincristine, a chemotherapy, leading to shortages as Pfizer was left as the sole supplier. The drug was mentioned 202 times in tandem with their company account.
HCP MENTIONS OF COMPANY TWITTER ACCOUNTS
| Company account | Account mentions |
| @VertexPharma | 647 |
| @TevaUSA | 429 |
| @JNJcares | 256 |
HCP mentions of top 50 pharmaceutical companies will be tracked monthly to observe how the rankings change over time. You can keep up to date with this and other pharmaceutical tracking including FDA and EMA drug approvals, within the Tracking section of CREATION Knowledge. For these updates straight to your inbox, you can sign up to our monthly eJournal.
Methodology notes:
- Mentions of companies by HCPs in all languages have been included in this research.
- Unless otherwise specified, mentions of a company are not limited to its Twitter account(s).
- In some cases, a tweet may mention more than one company account (eg. @abbottnews and @abbottglobal) – this only counts as one Company Mention but two Account Mentions.
- The Number of Twitter Accounts Mentioned only include those accounts mentioned by HCPs.
- * Johnson & Johnson was included as a whole, encompassing its pharmaceutical subsidiary, Janssen.
- ** Whilst included in the Top 50 Pharma list according to revenue from 2018, Shire has since been acquired by Takeda and no longer holds a Twitter account.
