Compliance

Ever since the meningitis outbreak associated with the products from the New England Compounding Center, the FDA and the States have been taking a closer look at this segment of the industry. So far, in 2013 alone, the FDA has issued 51 Safety Alerts for Human Medical Products, of which 17 (33%) related to sterile pharmacy compounded products and/or laboratories that tested those products for sterility and/or potency. In addition, FDA has taken 54 separate actions against compounding pharmacies in 2013 alone, with only 24 actions taken in the previous 5 years.

On August 20, 2013, FDA and the EMA (European Medicines Agency) published a document entitled, “EMA-FDA pilot program for parallel assessment of Quality-by-Design applications: Lessons learnt and Q&A resulting from the first parallel assessment.”   The Q&A document provides information regarding agreements that were made between the agencies as a result of the first FDA-EMA parallel […]

Yesterday, the FDA released an update to its 2007 Questions and Answers document on Medical Foods. Interestingly, it is the new information in this document that has us scratching our heads about the implications of this revised draft document.

FDA published its final Guidance to Industry – Safety Labeling Changes – Implementation of Section 505(o)(4) of the FD&C Act on July 30, 2013. Section 505(o)(4) (enacted under the FDAAA in 2007) gave the FDA new authority to require NDA, BLA and ANDA applicants for which there is no corresponding NDA to make certain label changes if there is new information available relative to safety issues. That new safety information may impact or require a Boxed Warning, changes to the Contraindications, Adverse Event or Warnings sections of the labeling. It could also require a change to a REMS program or patient information sheet.

, what is a PLAIR? It stands for Pre-Launch Activities Importation Request. Over the last few years, the FDA had issued some informal directions in the form of an instructions sheet and a Question and Answers document. Today the contents of those documents have been incorporated into a Draft Guidance

At the urging of the FDA, the Department of Justice (DOJ) filed suit against Sage Pharmaceuticals of Louisiana for the marketing of unapproved new drugs. The action comes after numerous warnings and a 2000 injunction against the firm for marketing two unapproved drugs. Failure to recognize that the FDA really meant what it said landed the company and two of its officers in hot water.