EFPIA Patients’ June Think Tank

The European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations (EFPIA) Patients’ Think Tank meeting took place on 19 June 2013 in Brussels. This quarterly event is the occasion for Patients’ organisations and the pharmaceutical industry to have a dialogue on EU policy issues in the area of health and innovative medical research.Jim Thomson represented the Alliance for Safe Online Pharmacy – EU (www.asop.eu) at the meeting. He introduced ASOP EU explaining that it plays a crucial role in bringing together all stakeholders to make the internet a safe place that enables patients to buy their medicines online safely where it is legal to do so. ASOP EU is looking to engage more with patients to ensure the dissemination of their recommendations and to benefit from patients’ opinions and experiences. EPF is currently an observer member of ASOP EU.

ZonMw, the Netherlands Organisation for Health Research and Development, is looking at strengthening the position of health consumers and patients and their organisations and stimulating participation in the health care system. Meralda Slager, from ZonMw, expressed their interest in exchanging knowledge and experiences with other organisations and presented the conclusions of the project’s first workshop (see the project in more details here, PDF 961kb).

Participants were also updated about our EUPATI project, the European Patient Academy on Therapeutic Innovation, where we  enable patients to understand therapeutic innovations. Participants debated on how to increase the uptake of this project and in particular engagement by industry.

The rest of the meeting provided participants with an update on the Clinical Trials debate and political agenda in the European Parliament. The sessions closed with the announcement of the new EFPIA Patient Think Tank Steering Committee members. EPF and EFPIA will also be represented on the Committee.

The next Think Tank meetings will take place on 19 September 2013 and 13 December 2013.

For more information, please contact Melanie Yammine who is coordinating Think Tank activities, at melanie.yammine@efpia.eu.