Improving Medicines For Children In Canada

"Recognizing the importance of developing safe and effective medicines specifically for children, the Minister of Health, on behalf of Health Canada, asked the Council of Canadian Academies to provide an evidence-based and authoritative assessment of the state of research and regulations leading to the approval of therapeutic products for children, in Canada and abroad. Specifically, this assessment examines the following questions: What is the state of clinical pharmacology, in Canada and abroad, that can be applied to the ethical development of safe and effective pharmaceuticals and biologics labelled as therapies for infants, children, and youth? How does human development from infancy to youth alter clinical pharmacology and therefore inform pediatric drug investigations? What are best practices to ethically conduct scientifically sound but adaptive drug studies to confirm the safety and effectiveness of drugs for infants, children, and youth? When the participation of infants, children, and youth in drug studies is not feasible, what are the best practices to confirm drug safety and effectiveness in these populations? What are Canada's strengths to contribute to global pharmacovigilance efforts for drugs that may benefit infants, children, and youth?"--Executive summary.

The Best Pharmaceuticals for Children Act (BPCA) and the Pediatric Research Equity Act (PREA) were designed to encourage more pediatric studies of drugs used for children. The FDA asked the IOM to review aspects of pediatric studies and changes in product labeling that resulted from BPCA and PREA and their predecessor policies, as well as assess the incentives for pediatric studies of biologics and the extent to which biologics have been studied in children. The IOM committee concludes that these policies have helped provide clinicians who care for children with better information about the efficacy, safety, and appropriate prescribing of drugs. The IOM suggests that more can be done to increase knowledge about drugs used by children and thereby improve the clinical care, health, and well-being of the nation's children.

This is the sixth in the series of edited books from the International Forums of Pediatric Pain (the first four volumes were edited by Dr. Patrick McGrath and Dr. Finley, Dr. Chambers joined as an editor for the last volume). In keeping with the previous publications, the book will focus on a particular theme in pediatric pain; in this case that is the integration of cutting edge science and clinical practice on various themes in pediatric pain through the presentation and discussion of a series of clinical cases. Description of Pediatric Pain: A Clinical Casebook: 10 chapters, 300 pages, 10 figures, 10 tables. Each chapter will consist of an introduction to the chapter theme and the description of up to 3 case presentations. Following each case presentation there will be a description of the relevant clinical decision-making and a summary of what can be learned from the case. Each chapter will close with a general discussion of the theme and an integration of research knowledge with practice.

In 1996 the Institute of Medicine launched the Quality Chasm Series, a series of reports focused on assessing and improving the nation's quality of health care. Preventing Medication Errors is the newest volume in the series. Responding to the key messages in earlier volumes of the seriesâ€"To Err Is Human (2000), Crossing the Quality Chasm (2001), and Patient Safety (2004)â€"this book sets forth an agenda for improving the safety of medication use. It begins by providing an overview of the system for drug development, regulation, distribution, and use. Preventing Medication Errors also examines the peer-reviewed literature on the incidence and the cost of medication errors and the effectiveness of error prevention strategies. Presenting data that will foster the reduction of medication errors, the book provides action agendas detailing the measures needed to improve the safety of medication use in both the short- and long-term. Patients, primary health care providers, health care organizations, purchasers of group health care, legislators, and those affiliated with providing medications and medication- related products and services will benefit from this guide to reducing medication errors.

The seventh edition of the Canadian Immunization Guide was developed by the National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI), with the support ofthe Immunization and Respiratory Infections Division, Public Health Agency of Canada, to provide updated information and recommendations on the use of vaccines in Canada. The Public Health Agency of Canada conducted a survey in 2004, which confi rmed that the Canadian Immunization Guide is a very useful and reliable resource of information on immunization.

Why We Need More Canadian Health Policy in the Media is a compilation of health policy commentaries published by EvidenceNetwork.ca experts in major newspapers in 2015. These articles highlight the most recent evidence on a wide range of health policy topics, including our aging population, healthcare costs and spending, mental health, pharmaceutical policy, the social determinants of health and distinctions between the Canadian and American healthcare system among other topics. This is the fourth volume in the annual series of eBooks produced by EvidenceNetwork.ca, the first being Canadian Health Policy in the News (2013), followed by Making Evidence Matter in Canadian Health Policy (2014) and Navigating the Evidence: Communicating Canadian Health Policy in the Media (2015). We acknowledge the Canadian Institutes for Health Research, Research Manitoba, the Manitoba Centre for Health Policy, the George and Fay Yee Centre for Healthcare Innovation, CIHR’s Institute of Health Services and Policy Research, and their Institute of Population and Public Health, The Canadian Frailty Network, and the University of Manitoba’s Department of Community Health Sciences and Max Rady College of Medicine whose funding supports EvidenceNetwork.ca.

This volume examines the trends of early-age mortality across time and space and the methodological and theoretical problems inherent in such studies. The approach is interdisciplinary, with contributions from demography, biology, medicine, and economic and social history. The geographical range encompasses Europe, North America, Japan, and India.