Postmarketing surveillance

Postmarketing surveillance (PMS), also known as post market surveillance, is the practice of monitoring the safety of a pharmaceutical drug or medical device after it has been released on the market and is an important part of the science of pharmacovigilance. Since drugs and medical devices are approved on the basis of clinical trials, which involve relatively small numbers of people who have been selected for this purpose – meaning that they normally do not have other medical conditions which may exist in the general population – postmarketing surveillance can further refine, or confirm or deny, the safety of a drug or device after it is used in the general population by large numbers of people who have a wide variety of medical conditions. Postmarketing surveillance uses a number of approaches to monitor drug and device safety, including spontaneous reporting databases, prescription event monitoring, electronic health records, patient registries, and record linkage between health databases. These data are reviewed to highlight potential safety concerns in a process known as data mining. Health Canada is the regulatory body which approves drugs, and it has a division called "Marketed Health Products Directorate" (MHPD) which coordinates Canadian postmarketing surveillance. The guidance document "MEDDEV 2.12-1 rev 8" offers a comprehensive guidance on best practice for medical device post-market surveillance (materiovigilance). The concept of post market surveillance is linked to the concepts of vigilance and market surveillance. A manufacturer of medical devices is required to report incidents (serious adverse events) to the national competent authority of the member state the company resides in.