The Protecting Canadians from Unsafe Drugs Act, also known as Vanessa's Law, is intended to increase drug and medical device safety in Canada by strengthening Health Canada's ability to collect information and to take quick and appropriate action when a serious health risk is identified. It will be mandatory for hospitals to report serious adverse drug reactions (serious ADRs) and medical device incidents (MDIs) to Health Canada, effective December 16, 2019.
Patients for Patient Safety Canada (PFPSC) created a presentation to help patients and the public understand and promote the reporting of serious adverse drug reactions and medical device incidents.
This module can be used in presentations and other information-sharing activities.
Please share the link to this page with anyone who you think needs to know about the new requirements for reporting to improve safety.
The presentation was adapted from 4 core PowerPoint modules developed in collaboration with Health Canada.
If you have questions about how to use these educational materials for your specific audience please contact patients@cpsi-icsp.ca
Why we need Vanessa’s Law
By Brendan Gribbons of Lower Mainland Biomedical Engineering
Consistent voluntary reporting followed by a thorough multi-incident analysis identified quickly a defect in IV tubing that resulted in a voluntary global recall of over 100 million IV tubing sets. Numerous alerts were generated regarding the uncontrolled flow, including from Health Canada and the manufacturer. This success story from British Columbia shows how Vanessa’s law can prevent harm. (This blog is in English only.)
