Code of Ethics in Malaysia and Asia Pacific to be launched in 2018 to govern the medical technology industry
The Association of Malaysian Medical Industries (AMMI) will launch a code of ethics in January 2018 to govern the medical technology industry in Malaysia and Asia Pacific.
AMMI announced this at an event called ‘Implementation of Code of Ethics in Malaysia and Asia Pacific’ in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia recently.
The sixty-over members of AMMI will have to abide the code once it is implemented. The
Code will cover the development, manufacturing, selling, marketing and distribution of medical technologies in Asia Pacific. It will also govern the conduct of healthcare practitioners.
“Many times, hospitals do not know who has been sponsored, for example a doctor who has gone to Switzerland for conferences,” Dato’ Dr Jacob Thomas, President of the Association of Private Hospitals of Malaysia (APHM) said at the event.
He said not only will the code curb lavish spending but it will also give all healthcare practitioners (HCPs) the equal chance to access grants to travel for medical-related events.
Furthermore, member organisations will not be allowed to select or influence the selection of direct pay to healthcare practitioners to attend third-party procedural trainings.
Errant companies will be named and shamed.
The United States and Europe have long implemented such a code.
“This is part of a global movement to ensure medical companies do not take advantage,” Campbell Clark, Chair of the Legal/Ethics and Compliance Committee of the Asia Pacific Medical Technology Association (APACMed), said.
“We want to increase the standards of all member companies,” he said.
“We’ve worked really hard. We want to see the Code work”
Formed in 1989, the Association of Malaysian Medical Industries (AMMI) represents leading medical device manufacturing companies in the medical technology industry in Malaysia. AMMI currently has 62 member companies and collectively, they account for more than half of the total export revenue for “Made-in-Malaysia” medical devices.
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