To broaden the scope of the Pharmacovigilance Programme of India (PvPI) through direct involvement of the patients, the Indian Pharmacopoeia Commission (IPC) last week extended the reach of its ambitious consumer reporting form by making it available in Hindi and five other regional languages. The form, which is now also available in Malayalam, Tamil, Gujarati, Bengali and Kannada aims at empowering patients in efficiently reporting the ADRs without the issue of any language barrier.

The forms will be available at all the designated ADR monitoring centres across the country, for the benefit of the patients. This feature basically enables them to choose the language in which they are comfortable in reporting the ADRs, if any. It is understood that, all the AMC coordinators have been duly directed to sensitise the patients and other stakeholders about this development, to avail this feature.

This decision was taken during the scientific body meeting that wrapped up last week. According to Dr Kalaiselvan, principal scientific officer, IPC, getting accurate data on the ADRs is very crucial for ensuring effective reporting of any adverse events, thus removing any form of communication barriers while reporting the same had been one of their priorities.

He further informed, “We want to empower the patients and make them know about their rights. Through this simple and user-friendly form, patients can now report to nearby ADR monitoring centre, or email the report to NCC directly or call the toll free number given in the form to get timely and effective assistance.”

This move comes in the wake of tremendous response received by IPC from the current version of consumer reporting form, available in English since it pilot launch in August this year. Interestingly, it was launched across all the 150 adverse drug reaction (ADR) centres in the country to gauge the impact it creates among the patients and on whether they are comfortable with the module prepared by them for reporting of ADRs in future.

As of now, there are two forms available in reporting of  ADRs; first one is red form for healthcare professionals and another one is blue form for consumers to report adverse events due to medicinal and health products administration.