Pharmacovigilance: Methods in Developing the Safety and Acceptability of Traditional Medicines

Traditional medicines are widely recognized and used as therapeutic agents such as anti-inflammatory, cough remedies, antipyretic, etc. The myth with public concerning traditional medicine is that it is safe to consume as it has been bestowed by our forefathers and it can be consumed without prescription which have led to self-medication which in turn often led to disappointing side effects and end results. There is alarming need for increasing awareness to develop pharmacovigilance practices with regard to herbal and traditional medicines. The present status of pharmacovigilance and its tools have been developed in relation to drugs which are synthetic in nature. With recent several prominent drugs withdrawn from the market, the pharmaceutical agencies have raised the issue of pharmacovigilance. Early uncovering of signals from clinical and pharmacovigilance studies has now been adapted by main companies in order to detect and identify the association of risk with medicinal products and to effectively manage the risk by applying health hazard management plans during the life cycle of the product. Applying the methods to monitor the safety of traditional medicine is an exclusive challenge. A strong, well-defined system for monitoring adverse events is in a position for evaluating the safety of the drugs. In today’s world, there is an immense need to understand and implement pharmacovigilance with more activity of clinical research conducted all over the globe.