Over the past twelve years, the Centre for Medicines Research has held a series of Workshops on a number of topics related to the drug discovery and development process. The major objective of these Workshops has been to provide an international forum for regula tory, academic and industry representatives to debate together, and suggest solutions to, specific problems. The meeting reported in this volume represents a departure from this approach, in that the par ticipants were drawn largely from the pharmaceutical industry. Senior clinicians, pharmacologists and toxicologists from companies...

As 1992 looms on the horizon and preparation is made for the completion of the internal market in Europe, the CMR realised the value of addressing some of the issues involved and defining the objectives and achievements of medicines regulations in a number of EEC countries in comparison with Japan and the USA. The overall aim was to use the lessons of past experience to determine the most appropriate way forward. The final debate focused on two possibilities for assessing and granting marketing authorisations for Europe, namely mutual recognition or a centrally organised European Med- icines...

The third CMR Workshop prov. ided the opportunity for a group of experts from the Industry, academia and the regulatory authorities to meet and discuss ways and means by which risk benefit decisions are made during the various stages of drug development. It became apparent from the discussions that took place in October 1985, at the CIBA Foundation, that decisions are often made with limited data and inadequate methodology. The conclusions drawn from the day's deliberations were as follows: 1. Current methodology for assessing risk and particularly benefits must be improved; 2. Safety must be...