WHO Programme for International Drug Monitoring
The WHO Programme for International Drug Monitoring was launched in 1968 as a pilot project of ten countries with established national reporting systems for ADRs. Since then, many more countries worldwide have developed national pharmacovigilance centres for the recording of ADRs and the reporting network has expanded significantly. Currently, a total of 86 countries participate in the International Drug Monitoring Programme. The Programme depends on a WHO Collaborating Centre based in Sweden (Uppsala Monitoring Centre), which is responsible for maintaining the global ADR database. VIGIBASE now contains more than three million ADR reports.
Structure of the WHO Programme for International Drug Monitoring
As part of its work, the WHO Collaborating Centre analyses the reports in the database to:
* identify early warning signals of serious adverse reactions to medicines;
* evaluate the hazard; and
* undertake research into the mechanisms of action to aid the development of safer and more effective medicines.
WHO also plays an important role in the provision of expert advice through an advisory committee, on all matters of safety of medicines. Its aim is to facilitate consistent policies and action among member countries and to advise those who may be concerned about action taken in another country.
The success of the WHO International Drug Monitoring Programme is entirely dependent on collaboration with national pharmacovigilance centres. Such centres provide an essential pool of experience and competence which has been instrumental in the continuous development of the WHO programme. Ideally every country should have a national pharmacovigilance system.
WHO International Drug Monitoring Programme: membership
References
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11. World Health Organization. Safety monitoring of medicines. Guidelines for setting up and running a pharmacovigilance centre. Geneva, 2000. http:// www.who.int/medicines
12. Linquist, A.M. seeing and observing in international pharmacovigilance. Uppsala, WHO Collaborating Centre for International Drug Monitoring, 2003.
13. Van Boxtel, CJ., Santoso, B., Edwards, I.R. Medicine benefits and risks. In: International Textbook of Clinical Pharmacology. John Wiley & Sons, Chichester, 2001.
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