Feature articles in June examined food safety in China, US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) guidance on supply chain disruptions, possible updates to the US Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA), and FDA and Federal Trade Commission (FTC) regulation of dietary supplements intended for treating or preventing certain mental health disorders.   Safety, disruptions, and responsive policy  China has improved its overall food safety situation significant...

Two industry trade associations and a pharmaceutical company are asking for some adjustments and clarification on the US Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA’s) draft guidance on safety reporting or investigational drugs and devices. The comment period on the guidance closed at the end of November.   FDA’s draft guidance includes details of how the agency believes investigators should report serious and non-serious adverse events in investigational new drug applicatio...

The article compares and contrasts the regulatory requirements for herbal medicinal products (HMPs), herbal-based medical devices and botanical food supplements in the EU. It is part 2 of a two-part article – Part 1 presented the definitions, main regulations, and documentation requirements for placing the products on the market; Part 2 will address quality, the strength of evidence supporting the safety and efficacy, and postmarket surveillance (PMS) requirements across...

Most of the 55 guidelines from the International Council on Harmonisation that relate to quality, safety and efficacy, as well as multidisciplinary guidelines, have been adopted among its 10 non-founding members and observers and 30 pharmaceutical companies, according to the results of a new survey.   The survey was designed to monitor the adequacy and level of implementation to ICH guidelines by regulators and industry and complements one released in 2019 on the adopt...

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) imposed a boxed warning on the labeling of rubidium 82 generators, which are used with Positron Emission Tomography (PET) heart perfusion imaging scans. The agency circulated the drug safety alert on Monday in response to recent excess radiation exposure incidents. Manufacturers Bracco Diagnostics and Jubilant DraxImage also sent letters last month to inform health care providers about incidents of patients’ exposure to high lev...

A little more than a year after pushing back the date by which combination product companies must comply with certain postmarket safety reporting (PMSR) requirements, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on Tuesday extended the compliance deadline again. The updated guidance explains how FDA does not intend to enforce 21 CFR 4.102(c) and (d) (constituent part-based PMSR requirements), 4.104(b)(1) and (b)(2) (submission process for constituent part-based Individual ...

Australia’s Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) released a three-part medical device action plan, part of which will make adverse event reports more timely, as well as enhance public awareness on and the agency and device regulatory system. The plan also identifies additional opportunities for TGA to increase transparency, with stakeholder consultations on proposed changes to regulatory requirements and forthcoming guidance materials. Until early 2020, potential c...

As part of efforts to make breast implants safer, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) should consider additional postmarket data reporting requirements on breast implant manufacturers, the agency’s General and Plastic Surgery Devices Panel suggested after a two-day meeting. On whether to remove textured breast implants from the US market as other countries have done, the panel argued data is lacking to support such a recommendation as it would reduce options for p...

Hundreds of thousands of units of Medtronic implantable cardiac devices, programmers and home monitors are vulnerable to cybersecurity incidents, according to two US federal government notices. On Thursday, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued an FDA safety communication, while the US Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) Industrial Control Systems Cyber Emergency Response Team (ICS-CERT) issued an advisory to flag cybersecurity vulnerabilities detected in...

Patients and health care providers should know that the safety and effectiveness of robotically-assisted surgical devices for the prevention or treatment of cancer has not been established for use in the US, a US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) safety communication warned on Thursday. The safety communication urges caution when using robotically-assisted surgical devices for mastectomy and any other cancer-related surgery, citing the lack of FDA evaluation on use of ...

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) alerted the public late Monday of a post-marketing safety clinical trial for Xeljanz (tofacitinib) that found an increased risk of lung blood clots and death in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) who were taking a dose of 10 mg twice daily. The drug safety communication noted the increased risk was observed in the post-marketing trial set as a requirement on Pfizer following the first approval  of Xeljanz in 2012. It comes...

Swissmedic said Monday that based on the currently available information, the association Swiss Plastic Surgery recommends using smooth implants rather than textured implants where permitted by the clinical situation. France’s National Agency of Medicine and Health Products (ANSM) echoed that recommendation after observing most known breast implant associated-anaplastic large cell lymphoma (BIA-ALCL) cases in patients with textured breast implants. But the committee doe...