About the centre

The goal of The WHO (World Health Organization) Collaborating Center for Research and Training in the Patient Perspective on Medicines Use is to help solve the many challenges in implementing rational use of medicines, like patient’s lack of adherence with medicine regimes and inappropriate self-medication.

Patients’ own understanding of a medicine regimen, and how it relates to their everyday life, is crucial for their intake of their medicine. Stakeholders need to assess and understand causes of these issues in their own country and must be provided with tools and techniques to rapidly gauge the patient perspective.

The Center has three main goals:

• To develop training materials about use of qualitative methods to explore patients perspective on medicines use in English.
• To assist WHO by conducting trainings focused in assessing the patient perspective on medicines use.
• To support WHO in developing strategies involving patient empowerment, raising awareness and knowledge about the patient perspective on medicines.
  
  

Professor Anna Birna Almarsdottir says:

"Currently, the patient’s perspective is highly prioritized by regulatory and HTA bodies, as well as by the pharmaceutical industry. No policy or intervention to promote rational use of medicines will be successful until the patient perspective is acknowledged, understood and integrated.

It is therefore important to develop quality training materials that will be used to assist WHO member states in collecting and analyzing qualitative data related to the patient perspective on medicines"