Vigilance Santé: Source of Data for the Digital Health Record

You’re in the middle of a consultation. A question comes up about a medication. You check your software, and the information is right there. Simple, fast, and reassuring. But have you ever wondered what happens between your click… and that instant response?

Between your familiar interface and the reliable information it provides lies a complex world of data, expertise, and scientific rigor… a discreet engine that powers your daily decisions.

Many essential features of clinical systems depend directly on structured drug data: whether it’s suggesting interchangeable medication substitutions, detecting allergies, or flagging potentially dangerous interactions. Though invisible to users, these databases are at the very heart of modern digital health systems. They play a vital role in ensuring the quality, safety, and efficiency of the care you deliver every day.

This is precisely the strength of the solutions developed by Vigilance Santé. For more than 30 years, our expertise in structuring drug information has fueled countless clinical systems behind the scenes, from pharmacy management software and electronic medical records, to care applications and, more recently, world-class platforms like Epic, which I’ll discuss later on.

In this article, I’d like to explore a question that has long been a passion of mine: how can we structure pharmaceutical data so that it becomes truly useful and actionable within clinical systems?

I’ll admit, it may not sound like the most tangible or spectacular topic. Yet, it is a cornerstone of digital health transformation. Without this robust foundation, interoperability between systems would be impossible, and the advanced features that support high-quality care could never be fully realized.

A Decisive Milestone: Canadian Data in the U.S. Epic Software

This year, we reached a significant achievement. Our entire dataset will be integrated into the U.S.-based Epic platform as part of Quebec’s Digital Health Record initiative, with pilot projects set to begin in November 2025.

Developed by Epic Systems Corporation, Epic is the world’s most widely used electronic health record system, supporting care in thousands of institutions worldwide. And for the very first time, a Canadian database will be used within this environment.

Until now, the Canadian version of this platform relied exclusively on U.S. data providers.

That’s why the integration of our database, which is entirely designed, developed, and maintained here in Canada, represents far more than just a technological change. It marks a significant step forward in credibility. It confirms that we have, right here at home, the expertise and know-how required to power world-class systems while respecting the unique realities of our Canadian context.

The Vigilance Santé Expertise

30 Years of Drug Data: The Journey to a Mature Database

 More than 30 years ago, Vigilance Santé’s drug database was born, developed to meet the everyday needs of community pharmacies. Back then, its main role was straightforward: ensuring the precise product name appeared on labels and streamlining the insurance claim process. Since those early days, it has grown far beyond its original scope, evolving into a rich and comprehensive source of clinically relevant data that now serves the entire Canadian market.

From a simple printing and billing tool, it has grown into a key resource for supporting high-quality medication therapy management across a wide range of clinical settings. These include pharmacy management systems, electronic medical records, clinical applications, and, more recently, large-scale digital health transformation projects.

What makes us a partner of choice, capable of supporting major collaborators in ambitious projects? Our ability to understand clinical needs, and to continuously adapt our solutions to meet them.

The DIN: Useful… But Not Enough

Even today, the DIN (Drug Identification Number) remains the reference identifier for dispensing and billing medications in community pharmacies. Issued by Health Canada when a drug is approved for sale in the country, this number has long been regarded as a reliable standard. In reality, however, it comes with several limitations:

• A single DIN may cover products of different volumes, as long as they share the same concentration.
  For example, the 1 mL and 2 mL vials of Teva-ipratropium Sterinebs (250 mcg/mL) share the same DIN, even though the total doses differ. Relying solely on the DIN to confirm that the correct product is dispensed therefore carries a risk of error.
• The DIN refers to the manufactured or administrable form of a product, without clearly distinguishing between the two. 
  For instance, the strength of antibiotics in powder form for oral suspension is expressed as “oral suspension,” which corresponds to the administrable form, while the manufactured form is labeled as “powder for oral suspension”. As a result, when the drug is purchased from a wholesaler, the form in which it is presented may not match the one expressed in the strength, which can easily lead to confusion. By contrast, for powders used to prepare injectable solutions, the opposite convention is used: the strength is always stated as the amount of active ingredient contained per vial.
• A single DIN can identify a kit containing several distinct products.
  An example is starter kits: some contain several dosages of the same medication to be taken in a specific sequence, while others combine multiple medications to be taken simultaneously. In these cases, no DIN exists to clearly identify each individual component of the kit.

The consequence? Since the DIN does not provide unambiguous identification of a pharmaceutical product, automating many clinical processes quickly becomes difficult. In some cases, it's imply impossible.

Rethinking the DIN as a Sole Identifier: An Ambitious Approach

To eliminate these gray areas, we at Vigilance Santé have developed a new, more granular and standardized data structure. Instead of grouping everything under a single DIN, our model breaks each DIN down into distinct concepts: virtual products, medicinal products, manufactured items, administrable products, packaging, and more.

Our model is based on recognized standards such as Identification of Medicinal Products (IDMP), Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR), SNOMED CT, and UCUM. This foundation ensures seamless interoperability between systems and full compatibility with international terminologies.

Better Data Precision Leads to Better Decisions

Our goal is simple: to faithfully represent pharmaceutical reality without imposing rigid editorial choices. By offering multiple levels of abstraction, we enable healthcare professionals to make clinical decisions based on highly precise data, rather than forcing them to adapt to the limits of an overly rigid model.

In practice, these abstractions allow software developers and clinical analysts to design powerful and useful features, such as:

• Prescribing by active ingredient or virtual product
• Real-time dose calculation
• Barcode validation at the point of administration
• Smarter inventory management
• Increased interoperability between systems

In other words, our database does more than just describe a medication. It captures all its nuances to support well-informed clinical decisions.

3 Partners + 3 Complementary Expertise = 1 Shared Impact

The integration of our database into the Epic platform did not happen in isolation. It is the result of close and sustained collaboration among the expert teams of three groups:

• Quebec’s Digital Health Record (DSN) Program Expertise Center
• Epic Systems Corporation
• Vigilance Santé

This synergy continues today through weekly meetings, ongoing priority reviews, and rigorous follow-up on every request using collaborative tools.

Working together in this way allows us to continuously enhance the quality of our data, thanks to the rapid feedback from field teams.

Together, we translate real clinical needs into concrete data structures, thus delivering benefits not only for healthcare professionals, but also for software development companies.

Lessons Learned from the Epic Systems Corporation Campus

The highlight of this collaboration took place last spring on the campus of Epic Systems Corporation in Verona, Wisconsin. In attendance were Sophie Marineau, Product Owner and Pharmacist; David Giguère, Data Modeling Pharmacist and Quality Lead; myself; and the team of pharmacists from the DSN Expertise Center.

Our role was clear: to support the loading of our data into the Epic platform by answering questions, conducting integration tests, and resolving technical issues in real time.

This visit also gave us the opportunity to discover Epic’s corporate culture, understand their working methods, and strengthen our ties with their team members. The immersion allowed us to gain a deeper understanding of how their software environment operates and how our data is integrated and used within it, greatly facilitating the continuation of our collaboration.

This collaborative experience confirmed an essential truth: Vigilance Santé’s role is far more than supplying data. We are a full-fledged partner, capable of working hand in hand with some of the most prominent leaders in digital health.

 Our partners have made it clear what sets us apart: our agility, our readiness to engage, and our ability to adapt and iterate quickly. Above all, they consistently point to the quality of our data, a defining strength and a key factor in what makes Vigilance Santé a trusted partner in shaping the future of healthcare.

A First Opportunity for Canada, but Certainly Not the Last

This integration of Canadian data into a U.S. platform marks an important milestone for Canadian healthcare systems. It shows that it is indeed possible to design and develop solutions right here at home that meet international standards while remaining tailored to our clinical realities.

And in my view, this is only the beginning.

Behind every high-performing system lies thoughtful, well-structured data, data capable, in its own way, of transforming healthcare. Not only from a technological standpoint, but above all in our daily practice with the patients we care for.

Projects like this collaborative effort pave the way for remarkable progress, and I look forward with anticipation to the advancements yet to come.

Notes

Abstraction :  Data abstraction means organizing complex drug information into clear, useful layers so professionals see only what they need to make safe and effective decisions. Go back to my reading