RT Journal Article SR Electronic T1 Retrospective View of the Interfacial Relationship of the Pharmaceutical Industry With the Food and Drug Administration and the United States Pharmacopeia JF PDA Journal of Pharmaceutical Science and Technology JO PDA J Pharm Sci Technol FD Parenteral Drug Association (PDA) SP 159 OP 163 VO 38 IS 4 A1 Hammer, Henry F. YR 1984 UL http://journal.pda.org/content/38/4/159.abstract AB American scientists and medical practitioners have produced and evaluated a major portion of the world’s leading health care technologies. Modern surgical procedures save lives, prolong life, ease pain, replace organs, and improve or restore the functions of parts of the body. Equally impressive are the prescription pharmaceutical products that have evolved which include several generations of potent anti-infective drugs; drugs that treat the mind, the cardiovascular system, and the central nervous system; drugs that modify the course of metabolic disorders, and others that are anti-inflammatory and ease pain. Some of these therapies, in fact, can obviate the need for surgical intervention in certain cases and often are instrumental in reducing the time of hospital confinement. Signficant benefits also accrue from medical devices that may be prosthetic, diagnostic or supportive of bodily functions. Although we have discovered and developed the most advanced health care technologies in the world, this technology often is not used to its full potential. This situation could be improved through better interactions among Industry, the FDA and the USP.