Prevalence and nature of manufacturer-sponsored patient support programs for prescription drugs in Canada: a cross-sectional study

Abstract

Background: Globally, pharmaceutical companies offer patient support pro grams in tandem with their products, which aim to enhance medication adher ence and patient experience through edu cation, training, support and financial assistance. We sought to identify the pro portion and characteristics of such patient support programs in Canada and to describe the nature of supports provided.

Understanding drug exceptional access programs (DEAPs) in Canada, and their associated social and political issues

“…Recent pharmaceutical industry development towards immunotherapies, gene therapies and more broadly personalized medicine have led these DEAPs to play a key role, allowing access to personalized treatments under conditions not yet approved, thus creating a form of parallel market. The pharmaceutical industry’s access programs, in the form of patient support programs or compassionate programs, which can be understood as DEAPs, are beginning to be studied and understood, but they remain very flexible and difficult to grasp [ 2 ]. Our interest here in this commentary is to refer more specifically to public DEAPs, without directly considering manufacturers’ support programs, which pose other specific problems.…”