11747 Professional Development courses delivered Online

Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) is a set of rules for medicines manufacturers to follow so that their products are safe, effective, and of good quality. The rules may be written into law or set out in guidance documents from regulatory authorities. Regulators will not allow medicinal products to be placed, or to remain, on the market in their country unless the products can be shown to be manufactured in compliance with GMP. To this end, they carry out inspections of manufacturing plants. Companies that persistently commit serious breaches of GMP requirements have suffered huge fines.

This module extends the learner’s understanding of pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic studies from the basics described in our companion module PKPD01, An Introduction to Pharmacokinetics and Pharmacodynamics in Drug Development and Registration. It provides detail on a variety of aspects of such studies: design, sampling, data analysis, research in special populations, and bioequivalence testing.

The warehouse plays a crucial role in a medicinal products factory. This module explains the requirements of Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) for the warehouse, and how to comply with them.

Medicines for the prevention, diagnosis, or treatment of rare diseases have become known as ‘orphan drugs’ because of their commercial unattractiveness. Development of such products is successfully encouraged through incentives offered by regulatory authorities. To qualify for important incentives, the sponsor of a drug must gain ‘orphan designation’ for its use in an indication. This module describes the requirements for orphan designation and how to apply for it in the USA and the European Economic Area.

The CTD is the internationally recognised standard format for submissions to medicines regulatory authorities. In the European Economic Area, the USA and Canada, the CTD, in its electronic format (eCTD), is mandatory for all applications for marketing approval and all subsequent related submissions. The CTD is accepted in many other countries, being mandatory for new prescription medicines in some. This module explains the rationale for the CTD and provides guidance on its structure and format and the ways in which it is used.

The sponsor of a clinical trial needs to reach agreement with clinical investigators to conduct the trial. The suitability of investigators and their institutional sites, typically hospitals, has to be evaluated, and the trial has to be set up at each site. This module describes the processes involved, focusing particularly on the role of a Clinical Research Associate (CRA) employed or contracted by the sponsor to monitor the trial.

This module provides an understanding of how clinical trials fit into the drug development process. It outlines the key historical events leading to the development of controlled clinical trials. It specifies the purpose of trials, outlines their features, and identifies codes and regulations that apply to them. Finally, it describes the environment of cost control in which the modern pharmaceutical industry operates.

This module provides a guide to signal detection and management for approved products. The subject is presented as a process comprising four stages: signal detection, signal validation, signal analysis and prioritisation, and risk assessment and minimisation.