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The Uppsala Monitoring Centre

The Uppsala Monitoring Centre (UMC), in addition to maintaining three databases (Vigibase, WHO Drug Dictionary Enhanced, and WHO-ART; see Chapter 14) also provides many services in pharmacovigilance and has done much seminal work in drug safety.

The UMC is responsible for the WHO Programme for International Drug Monitoring (Web Resource 27-1). This program consists of a network of about 98 National Drug Safety Centers, the WHO in Geneva, and the UMC in Sweden. Its functions include:

• Identification and analysis (including use of data mining) of new adverse reaction signals from the case report information submitted to the national centers, and sent from them to the WHO ICSR database.
  
• Information exchange between WHO and national centers, mainly through “Vigimed,” an e-mail information exchange system.
  
• Publication of periodical newsletters (WHO Pharmaceuticals Newsletter and Uppsala Reports), guidelines, and books in the pharmacovigilance and risk management area.
  
• Supply of tools for management of clinical information, including adverse drug reaction case reports. The main products are the WHO Drug Dictionary and the WHO Adverse Reaction Terminology.
  
• Training and consulting support to national centers and countries establishing pharmacovigilance systems.
  
• Computer software for case report management, designed to suit the needs of national centers (VigiFlow).
  
• Annual meetings for representatives of national centers, at which scientific and organizational matters are discussed.
  
• Methodological research for the development of pharmacovigilance as a science.
  
• The UMC has also published many important scientific articles in pharmacovigilance.

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