Post Marketing Surveillance Support

Overview

Post Marketing Surveillance (PMS) of Medical Devices is the practice of monitoring the safety of a Medical Device after it has been released in the market. PMS guidelines are a collection of processes and activities used to monitor the safety, performance, and effectiveness of Medical Devices.

These activities are designed to generate information in the form of a Post Marketing Surveillance Report regarding the use of the device to expediently identify device design and/or usage problems and accurately characterize the real-world device behavior and clinical outcomes. 

The need for post-marketing surveillance arises immediately upon the commercialization of the device. Ensuring adequate medical input into the risk management process during device development will help manufacturers characterize possible product safety issues. It is important to note that the post-marketing surveillance requirements should be directly proportional to the risk associated with the device based on its intended use. A post-marketing surveillance plan must be provided as a part of the assessment for device certification based on requirements from country-specific regulatory agencies and should be based on available clinical data and an assessment of residual risks. The results of the PMS data shall be periodically submitted in the form of a Post-Marketing Surveillance Report. These Post-Marketing Surveillance Reports shall be updated in case of device changes.

However, PMS requirements vary greatly between different Medical Device markets, requiring manufacturers to develop a targeted strategy and avoid one-size-fits-all tactics. For instance, the EU Post Market Surveillance requirements differ significantly from that of the US FDA.