In early August 2016, FDA issued a Guidance document for “Insanitary Conditions at Compounding Facilities” that states that under Section 501(a)(2)(A) of the FD&C Act that any drug prepared under insanitary conditions is adulterated. This document defines a drug as any compounded human or animal drugs; repackaged drug products; compounded or repackaged radiopharmaceuticals; and mixed, […]
Four Federal register notices published today announce the FY 2017 user fee rates for the Prescription Drug User Fee Act (here) , the Biosimilar User Fee Act (here), the Animal Drug User Fee Act (here) and the Animal Generic Drug User fee Act (here). PDUFA Fees for FY 2017 Biosimilar User Fees for FY 2017 […]
In February 2014, then FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg issued a memorandum directing all Centers and the Office of Regulatory Affairs (ORA) to develop a plan for more collaboration and efficiency in operations. As a result of this mandate, the Centers and ORA have developed fiscal year plans to move toward a distinct commodity-based, vertically-integrated regulatory […]
The FDA recently issued a draft Guidance document; entitled “Control of Elemental Impurities in Drug Products”. This document provides guidance in light of the issuance of ICH Q3D Elemental Impurities and USP<232> Elemental Impurities – Limits and USP<233> Elemental Impurities – Procedures. USP <232>. Upon implementation (scheduled Jan 1, 2018), USP<232> and USP<233> will replace […]
The FDA today released a technical reference document entitled, “Quality Metrics Technical Conformance Guide for the Implementation of the Draft FDA Guidance for Industry on Requests for Quality Metrics.” This Guide supplements the above referenced draft Guidance and outlines how the FDA would like the information on quality metrics collected and reported. Remember that, as stated […]
In April 2016, the FDA published its much-anticipated draft Guidance on Data Integrity. This Guidance is a great way for industry and FDA to start and continue the dialogue about data integrity. An interesting note about this Guidance is that buried, deep down on line 142, is a mention of “cloud infrastructure” as a “system” as it relates to “computer or related systems” in § 211.68. Up until this point, the FDA has been largely silent on the use of cloud computing for FDA regulated systems, and industry has taken this silence to be, in many ways, a prohibition to its use.
While the number of data integrity (DI) findings have increased over the last few years, as evidenced by citations in a number of Warning Letters, the FDA stance on DI seems to have mellowed since the generic drug scandal of the late 1980s. The FDA guidance document (here) walks firms through their responsibilities in assuring […]
The integrity of data used to ensure the quality of drugs is paramount to a drug’s safety and efficacy and can have a great impact on public health. The topic of “Protecting and Promoting Data Integrity” was presented by Kathleen Culver from FDA (Field Investigator and Drug Preapproval Manager, FDA Cincinnati District), Tracy Moore (Senior GMDP Inspector and GMDP Operations Manager, MHRA), and Paul Vogel (Chairman, Lachman Consultant Services, Inc.) at the recent PharmaLink Conference, which was co-sponsored by Xavier Health and the FDA, held on March 16-17, 2016 in Cincinnati, Ohio.
The key to developing a practical approach to all phases lies in the establishment of Critical Quality Attributes (CQA) for the drug product and assignment and monitoring of Critical Process Parameters (CPP) that have a direct effect on the performance of the process with regard to the CQA. At the PDA Annual Meeting last week, Scott Bazzone, Senior Manager of Quality Assurance Validation at Pfizer presented the approach that is used there with regards to establishing the risk significance or Z Score of a CPP to the CQA.
The Office of Generic Drugs (OGD) has updated its organization chart, but trying to figure out who is who in most of the OGD Office and Divisions remains a bit mysterious. Try to find the titles and position of many of the OGD staff and you kind of run into an electronic wall. Even if you know their names, their position and location within OGD, they are not easily discernible.
