What is representatives' briefing material?

  • 15.9

    15.9 Companies must prepare detailed briefing material for medical representatives on the technical aspects of each medicine which they will promote. A copy of such material must be made available to the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency and the Prescription Medicines Code of Practice Authority on request. Briefing material must comply with the relevant requirements of the Code and, in particular, is subject to the certification requirements of Clause 14.

    Briefing material must not advocate, either directly or indirectly, any course of action which would be likely to lead to a breach of the Code.

When a complaint is received about how a representative promoted a medicine the Authority may request a copy of the relevant briefing material. Briefing material must comply with the appropriate requirements of Clause 15.9 of the Code and must be certified.

It must not advocate, either directly or indirectly, any course of action which would be likely to lead to a breach of the Code. The detailed briefing material referred to in the Code consists of both the training material used to instruct representatives about a medicine and the instructions given to them as to how the product should be promoted.

Companies are reminded that briefing material can come from a number of sources including, inter alia, the marketing, training and sales departments. Even memoranda or emails written by field managers to their representatives could, according to content, be viewed as briefing material. All briefing material, whatever its source, is subject to the Code and must be certified before use.