Our performance

The safety of the patients who take our medicines are of fundamental importance to us.

Objectives

Enhance pharmacovigilance awareness – including in less developed markets where AstraZeneca operates.

Targets

Develop a pharmacovigilance awareness programme to address the needs identified in one or more less developed markets to improve pharmacovigilance capability to protect patient safety.

Expand AstraZeneca global patient safety standard to include and promote a consistent approach to branded generic products.
 

Number of regulatory authorities in developing countries with which we have explored the scope for collaborative programmes to share and use AstraZeneca’s pharmacovigilance knowledge and best practice acquired in developed countries in order to improve reporting and patient safety in developing countries.

Measurement of our external reputation relating to pharmacoviligance and patient safety standards.

A pharmacovigilance awareness programme was developed in 2012 and circulated to marketing companies, together with guidance about how the information should be shared with regulatory authorities in readiness for external enquiry. One such opportunity arose when SFDA (The Chinese Health Authority) met UMC (WHO Uppsala Monitoring Centre) and we were able to share our experience and thoughts around signal management.

Standards for Acquisition of a Branded Generic was introduced in May 2012.

We track stakeholder opinion in a number of key areas including patient safety. 2012 data indicates that the majority of the stakeholders surveyed (including doctors, specialist healthcare professionals and payers in Algeria, Australia, Brazil, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Norway, Saudi Arabia and Sweden) have either a positive or neutral view of AstraZeneca's commitment to patient safety.