The Ghana FDA department dispatched a Pharmacovigilance team to investigate the death of 3 patients caused due to contaminated Benzathine Penicillin injection. The preliminary investigations revealed that due to contaminated 0.9 normal saline solution which was used in reconstituting Penicillin powder for injection had led to fatality of the patients. The primary cause of death was determined to be injection site abscess, other serious adverse drug reaction included were skin necrosis and ulcers. The reason for contamination was stated as the re use of normal saline solution for several days at the Health Centre in the Asuogyaman District. In the statement regarding Benzathine Penicillin, it has been clearly indicated that sterile water should be used for reconstitution. The healthcare professionals have been asked to be more vigilant and report any untoward medical occurrence through submitting adverse event forms to the FDA or even by direct contact through the availabl...

There would be an increase in fees upto 1.7 % from April 1 st 2018 as mentioned in the notification of Commission Regulation (EU) No 2018/471 (amending Council Regulation (EC) No 297/95), the fees however would be implemented for all activities carried out by the agency except pharmacovigilance . Apart from Pharmacovigilance the agency has also exempted fees of Micro Small or Medium Sized Enterprise, Orphan Medicinal Products, Medicinal Products for Paediatric Use, Advanced Therapy Medicinal Products etc… Detailed information on has been provided on an explanatory note. The agency every year revises its fees as per the statistical data from EUROSTAT ( European Union’s statistical office ), the current revision is made in accordance with the inflation rate for 2017. Reference: 1.        Explanatory note on general fees payable to the European Medicines Agency http://www.ema.europa.eu/docs/en_GB/document_library/Other/2018/03/WC500246428.pdf...

Eritrea an African country located in the north east region on the red coast sea bordering Ethiopia and Sudan, has been reported as the top country in reporting adverse drug reaction through safety reports submitted to global database by the Uppsala Monitoring Centre (Sweden), the collaborating centre for WHO as part of their international drug monitoring programme. The Pharmacovigilance programme of Eritrea was carried out at maturity LEVEL THREE as per UMC with the assistance of local strength engaged in providing harmonization. Eritrea has identified 11 safety concerns on their medicinal products, which were also published in international peer reviewed journals. The Eritrean work on Pharmacovigilance has been globally acknowledged with insights on revising the policy of Eritrean Healthcare system. Recognizing the significant contribution made in pharmacovigilance,Eritrea along with Netherlands and Peru has been invited for the upcoming 40 th Anniversary of UMC o...

Pharmacovigilance as we know is a science with a set of pre defined functions to collect, analyse, monitor adverse event reports in understanding the safety profile of drug. The set pre defined functions would include case processing through data entry of adverse event forms into safety database, medical review, aggregate reporting, signal detection, risk evaluation and mitigation strategies. With patients awareness and regulatory compliance we may have seen a surge of adverse event data over last few years , resulting in the urgent need for the application of automation. Pharmacovigilance is the only discipline where in which timelines and quality data are evaluated on a benchmark of 100 % and a compromise in these two parameters are considered to be a zero tolerance. Automation of above pre defined function is possible through machine learning, which is an integral components of Artificial Intelligence. What is Artificial Intelligence ?     ...

Proactive pharmacovigilance through  Social media data Adverse drug events (ADEs) are a significant cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide. Clinical drug trials have limited ability to detect all ADRs due to various reasons: small sample sizes, relatively short durations, lack of diversity among participants usually excludes specific conditions: kids, elderly, pregnant women, patients with co-morbidities. Pharmacovigilance practice has evolved and grown more complex over the past 5 to 10 years due to higher data volumes, evolving regulations, increased influence of emerging markets and the emergence of social media and innovative technological advances. Social media is a promising source for new safety data and potential emergent safety signals. Social media may be a method by which pharmacovigilance could be strengthened given that approximately 72% of internet users search for health information online. Social media have significantly expanded recently with Twitte...

FOR HEALTHY US The ever changing environment and day to day stress starting from the childhood for securing higher grades leading up to the never ending demands of the boss pushing for more. Everyone today is either already been affected by some or the other type of medical condition or is at the high risk of developing one.  The major sufferer is the health of an individual, which affects the individual’s quality of life and hampers the growth of the nation too. But thanks to the professionals involved in the health services that we are constantly able to manage our health and stay fit. Clinical Research plays an important role in offering us the solutions to our health challenges with safe drugs and devices.  Scientists conduct Clinical trials, a research study that tests how well an intervention works in a group of people. It tests for new methods of screening, prevention, diagnosis or therapy. Clinical trials are conducted in different phases, ADR Reporting ...

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is condition in which the immune system attacks myelin sheath, which may eventually damage the neurons and leave scar tissue, relapsing multiple sclerosis is a type of sclerosis in which there is flare up following remission, which means during the relapsing phase, the symptoms of MS will partially or completely go away.  daclizumab is a type of Interleukin 2 receptor (IL2R) antagonist which is used in the treatment of MS. (Interleukin is a type of Cytokine which binds with IL2R to generate immune responses, a type cell signalling)  daclizumab was administered as an injection under brand ZINBRYTA, which was first approved by FDA on 27 th May 2016, however recently the Pharmacovigilance Risk Assessment committee (PRAC), a part of European Medical Agency recommended restrictions on using daclizumab, due to safety issues associated with serious liver damage (as reported in a clinical trial where 1.7 % subjects developed serious liver reaction, a su...

In Pharmacovigilance -Case processing after completing the data entry process and before routing the case to the next workflow (Medical Review), it is mandatory for everyone to do a Validation check called as E2B validation, E2B validation error could also be an error associated with a special character in case study narrative or in adverse event, further if an error is reported on Validation check which cannot be rectified, a comment stating ‘E2B validation was noted and bypassed’ should be used contact log Every wondered why? Every ICSR (Individual case safety report) as per 21 CFR 314.80 in US and Schedule Y appendix XI in India, should be transmitted from the reporting sources to the regulatory authority and this process is also known as E2B submission (as we submitting E2B files) and because one of the mode of transmission is via XML format, if a special character found in the ICSR which is not rectified after the ICSR is converted into an XML file and upload as an...

Tuberculosis is an infectious and contagious disease caused by a bacteria called Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis primarily affects the lungs, symptoms include: chronic cough with blood in Phlegm, fever. Pharmacovigilance imparts a vital role in monitoring serious Adverse drug reactions (ADRs) in TB patients who are on treatment in national TB program. ADRs could lead to a tuberculosis (TB) patient interrupting treatment before completion, and can thus contribute to avoidable morbidity, drug-resistance, treatment failure, reduced quality of life, or death. Tuberculosis is completely curable using short term chemotherapy called DOTS or Directly Observed Treatment Short course. However, there are several challenges encountered by patient to get DOTS treatment in India. Some of the challenges include coping up with DOTS strategy. In a recent research paper published by (research, team name), it had a study which in which TB patients were interviewed, the paper ...

Pharmacovigilance is Booming with its market size expected to expand at a CAGR of 14.2% through 2020. In 2014 the market was at 2,75 Mn $ which is now expected to reach 6,10 Mn $ by 2020. It is believed that the growth is attributed to CAGR of 15.5% in Phase III clinical trials, further needless to say that 57% of global pharmaceutical companies outsource their projects to contract research organization.                Outsourcing trend of pharmaceutical companies has projected increase the market size of Pharmacovigilance , which in turn benefits the not only the vendor (by creating more job opportunities) , it also benefits the Pharmaceutical giants by increasing their capitalization by working on shorter turn-around time and also avoiding operational cost in Talent acquisition and Infrastructure for carrying drug safety operations. Reference:  https://goo.gl/h3vc8i

Merck Sharp & Dohme (MSD) Corp., a subsidiary of Merck & Co., Inc has developed an Artificial Intelligence (AI) chat bot. The MSD Salute chat bot is designed to aid physicians in providing product information and pathology.  The Physicians who are registered with MSD would use the Chat bot using facebook messenger.  Chat bot is derived from the social media and uses machine learning and implements feedback to develop interactions.  Currently MSD is monitoring and not filtering the communication between Chat bot and users, as they want to analyse the open ended exchanges between the AI and the users. Chat bot currently in the testing phase, is said augment patient safety through proactive pharmacovigilance .  We at Think I are also driven to produce Pharmacovigilance safety database solutions using cloud based technology which are not only cost effective and user friendly but also fully validated for quick, easy import, entry and electronic ...

The Indian pharmacopeia commission (IPC) has developed an android based application for reporting adverse drug reactions. The app under the name PVPI ADR would facilitate auto filling of data with easy attachments of source documents/ image files comprising of laboratory test reports etc. and would generate XML files, facilitating E2B submissions. The app could be easily used by both health care professionals and consumers. Under the ‘Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana’  a Skill development programme was organized where by , the IPC , National coordinating centre- Pharmacovigilance programme of India (NCC PvPI) under the Union Health Ministry have trained 300 physicians and pharmacist. India is transcending as one of the nations with robust pharmacovigilance and patient safety systems. We at Think I are also driven to produce Pharmacovigilance safety  database solutions using cloud based technology which are not only cost effective and user friendl...

European Medical Agency would be releasing a new version of EudraVigilance system, which is expected to go live in November 2017, EMA in their report mentioned that they would be publishing a checklist of readiness for all the stakeholders to prepare them for the changes which will come along with the launch of the revised version of EudraVigilance, for which EMA also intends to provide eLearning modules, support webinars and face to face training. The prototype of EudraVigilance test environment or XCOMP is already scheduled to be released June 2017 which will let all the National competent authorities to test Individual case safety reports in E2B R3 versions. We at Think I are also driven to produce Pharmacovigilance safety  database solutions using cloud based technology which are not only cost effective and user friendly but also fully validated for quick, easy import, entry and electronic submissions of adverse event.  For more details, contact us at +91 ...

In the recent times we have seen a growing prevalence of diseases and chronic disorders, in order to eradicate life threatening diseases and chronic conditions, we have made one leap forward towards developing an effective pharmacovigilance system, with the sole aim to provide robust patient safety, through monitoring adverse drug reactions, signal detection and risk management plan. Collection, detection, assessment and monitoring of adverse event through  icsr pharmacovigilance  requires specialized IT framework with the capabilities of Intelligent Automation for computing frequency of adverse events using complex algorithms and statistical disproportions, which will help us then to understand the benefit-risk profile of the drug, paving way for an effective risk management plan. With PvPI facilitating drug safety activities in India, In the current scenario there is an strong need for collaboration of IT segment with PvPI to build an in house safety solu...