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Int J Clin Pharm (2011) 33:722723 DOI 10.1007/s11096-011-9537-7
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Role of the hospital pharmacy and therapeutics committee in detecting and regulating off-label drug use, reply to letter
Esther Duran-Garcia Bernardo Santos-Ramos
Francesc Puigvents-Latorre Ana Ortega
Received: 20 June 2011 / Accepted: 1 July 2011 / Published online: 17 August 2011 Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
Dear Sir,
We appreciate the comments to our paper [1] and agree with most of the considerations, especially those related to the role of Pharmacy and Therapeutics Committees (PTC) in regulating the off-label use of drugs in hospitals.
As indicated by the authors, there is an important variability on the quality of data that support the off-label use of drugs. In some cases, there is no scientic support, nor safety data or the off-label use is not cost-effective. However, sometimes, the use of the drug for an indication other than those approved is fully justied. There may be good evidence to support its use but the pharmaceutical companies may have no commercial interest in conducting the studies and paperwork required to obtain...