Post-Marketing Surveillance: An Art or a Science?

Abstract

Recent controversies have shown that problems in post-marketing surveillance (PMS) are far from being solved. Thus it is still legitimate to examine critically some of the principles or presuppositions which have resulted in the current state of the art. As a result of a slightly philosophical look, this kind of work certainly gets bad press in scientific circles. However, Drug Monitoring is presently looking for specific techniques, and there is no proven methodology to evaluate the methods themselves: Critical examination of methodological principles is typically a matter for epistemology.