Dr. Cora Nestor:

The professional role of the pharmacist is to advise patients on the correct use of a product. In terms of the supply of products, a pharmacist must be capable of calculating the dose of a product, advising the patient on how to use it and on any influence it might have on other medicines they are taking and on other issues such as interactions with food and so on. In regard to vigilance and the access programme, my understanding is that the HPRA's recommendation is that data on patients going through the programme should be collated. There would be an opportunity arising from the access programme to collect data and to continuously learn in regard to the safety profile which the HPRA says has not been established.