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Showing posts from March, 2023

Can Medical Practitioners dispense medicines?

  Can Medical Practitioners dispense medicines? The question of whether clinical specialists should sell medicines at their clinic has been raised on several occasions but still remains unanswered.In India, the manufacturing, storing, transportation, conveyance, and administering of drugs and medicines are governed under various statutes, including: The Drugs and Cosmetic Act, 1940; Indian Medical Council Act, 1956; The Pharmacy Act, 1948; and The Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985. Section .42 of the Pharmacy Act requires mandatory registration of pharmacists selling medicines but exempts DOCTORSs from this requirement.  Recently, the Pharmacy Council of India had unanimously adopted a resolution requiring an amendment of S.42 of the Pharmacy Act permitting DOCTORSs to sell medicines to their patients. Rajan B Rajan, former President of the Kerala State Pharmacy Council, also demanded following up on the implementation of this resolution. It is argued tha

Doctors can store medicines in small quantities-Apex court direction given in march-2023

  SC: Doctor can’t be punished under D&C Act for storing small quantities of medicines. Case Title: S. Athilakshmi vs. The State Rep. By The  Drugs Inspector  [SLP (Criminal) No. 9978 of 2022] Citation: 2023 LiveLaw (SC) 194 The Supreme Court has held that a doctor's act of storing small quantities of medicines will not amount to an offence of unauthorized stocking of medicines under Section 18(c) of the Drugs and Cosmetics Act 1940. "When small quantity of medicine has been found in the premises of a registered medical practitioner, it would not amount to selling their medicines across the counter in an open shop",  observed a bench comprising  Justices Krishan Murari and Sudhanshu Dhulia  while quashing the criminal proceedings against a Tamil Nadu-based doctor under the Drugs and Cosmetics Act 1940.   The bench noted that the quantity of medicines which was allegedly seized from the premises of the petitioner was extremely small, a quantity which can be easily

CLINICAL INTELLIGENCE ENGINE : Role of Artificial Intelligence in Health care and public health management!

It’s an Intuitive Clinical Assistant, developed by Apollo and distributed freely to all doctors that can be a game changer especially for day to day OPD care especially in primary and secondary care.  The Clinical Intelligence Engine (CIE) is capable of analyzing vast amounts of data to help healthcare professionals in differential diagnosis . Numerically, the intelligence engine has over 1300 conditions and 800 symptoms in its vocabulary, covering 95 per cent of everyday case mix in OPDs. Built by over 100 engineers, using 40 years of data from Apollo and the collective intelligence of 1000s of doctors along with supporting data from peer-reviewed journals, it is among the largest connected health data lakes in the world, which has been tested and validated by quite a few global academic institutions. This intuitive clinical engine can - 1. Bridge the gap in increased healthcare demand with multi- channel access to safe, clinically validated health interactions. 2. Provide actiona