FDA EMBARKS ON #MEDSAFETY WEEK CAMPAIGN

The Food and Drug Authority(FDA) in its quest to contribute to safe medicines by identifying and reporting side effects has established a robust safety monitoring system to detect and analyse side effects of medicines under the theme: Who Can Report?

It said, the importance of reporting side effects by using reporting forms available in healthcare facilities and community pharmacies designated as patient safety centres or by using the Med Safety App is that over the years, the FDA has processed a number of reports in which patients,  and health professionals played key roles in making the reports available.

The Campaign which aims to raise awareness about the importance of reporting side effects of medicines is a global #Medsafety week campaign, a collaboration involving more than 80 medicines regulatory agencies and several non-governmental organizations.

It said, the purpose of the Safety monitoring which centered on the key role of every patient, caregiver, doctor, nurse and pharmacist who reports a side effect and contributes to medicine safety is to gain more information about known side effects and find out about new ones.

Describing the convenient use of the Med Safety App, the Authority noted that, continuously collecting and monitoring information from the reports received helps the FDA to identify risks associated with medicines to enable the appropriate regulatory action to be taken to improve medicine safety.

“It is freely available on App Store or Google Play Store.One may also report to any of the FDA regional offices nationwide.All reports made to FDA are thoroughly assessed to determine the right steps to be taken to protect public health and safety”.It concluded.