Helpline facility to assist reporting of adverse drug reactions in India.

Address for correspondence: Dr Vivekanandan Kalaiselvan, Principal Scientific Officer, Indian Pharmacopoeia Commission, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Sector 23, Rajnagar, Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh 201002, India Email: [email protected] We wish to draw colleagues’ attention to the launch of a helpline facility for health-care professionals and the public – especially those in rural areas – to report adverse drug reactions to the Indian Pharmacopoeia Commission (IPC). In 2010, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India, launched the nationwide Pharmacovigilance Programme of India (PvPI) to monitor the safety of medicine. IPC, an autonomous institution, established under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India, Ghaziabad, has been functioning as the National Coordination Centre (NCC) for PvPI since April 15th 2011.1 The main responsibility of the NCC is to monitor adverse reactions to medicines observed in the Indian population and to develop and maintain its own pharmacovigilance database.2 Adverse drug reaction monitoring centres (AMCs) have been set up across the country by the PvPI; there are currently 150 of these centres, which monitor the adverse drug reactions and report to the NCC. This system allows health-care professionals to report any adverse drug reactions in their areas of work, but may not bridge the gap between general public and NCC.