Medicines and Therapies

Fewer than half of pharmacies audited in the last quarter of 2020 are achieving “full compliance”, according to the latest Pharmacy Quality Audits figures, falling from 56 to 45 per cent on the previous quarter

Medsafe is standing by its statement that the anti-COVID nasal spray Enovid cannot be sold in New Zealand, despite claims to the contrary from the Canadian company that makes it

Medsafe has denied claims that a Canadian anti-COVID nasal spray has been approved for sale in New Zealand

Medsafe acknowledges it’s been a tough year for pharmacy but is working with sector groups to improve performance

Pharmac is asking prescribers to stop prescribing one of New Zealand’s most widely used blood pressure medications and attempt to move patients to alternatives

Following Pharmac going ahead with a controversial drug switch for epilepsy, a suggestion to health authorities to add an alert prompt to the pharmacy PMS was ignored, Pharmacy Guild chief executive Andrew Gaudin says

The chair of Pharmac’s Pharmacology and Therapeutics Advisory Committee was grilled today over the body’s approach to assessing whether a controversial drug-funding switch should have taken place 

In painstaking detail today, Pharmac outlined steps taken to manage a controversial anti-epilepsy drug-funding switch, while a UK epilepsy advocate offered the coronial inquest an alternative approach

Communication between people with epilepsy, their doctors and between agencies, around the potential risks of switching brands of anti-epileptic lamotrigine was examined at today’s epilepsy deaths inquest 

Shortages of OTC pharmacy products created by COVID-19 last year are not letting up but an importer of major brands is hopeful the situation will improve this year