Elsevier acquires drug & clinical info company.

Elsevier Science (Philadelphia, PA) has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire the entire share capital of Gold Standard, Inc. (Tampa, FL), a developer of online clinical drug information products, services and solutions for the healthcare market. No terms of the deal were given.

Established in 1993, Gold Standard is a developer and provider of drug information databases, software and clinical information solutions. The company produces five main services. Alchemy is a clinical decision support system designed to fulfill all the drug information requirements for healthcare systems and applications. Clinical Pharmacology is a drug information and medication management resource for retail pharmacy chains, U.S. pharmacy and medical schools, hospitals, web sites and healthcare professionals. It covers all prescription drugs and produces monographs, overviews, drug comparisons and drug interaction reports.

Gold Standard's eMPOWERx service offers wireless patient specific drug histories, prescribing capabilities, and drug information at the point of care, while its PIER (Physicians' Information and Education Resource) service offers access to evidence-based guidelines, educational resources, clinical data, and "disease modules" with guidance and recommendations for 400 diseases. Finally, Clini-Doc allows pharmacists to obtain a financial measure of clinical interventions and time spent maximizing the safety and efficacy of drug therapy through the use of documentation and graphical reports. Its purpose is to raise the awareness of the economic impact pharmacists have on the cost of healthcare.