New social impact start-up makes medical history

Published: 23-Aug-2018

A new medicines intermediary opens up access to medicines otherwise unavailable in the UK

A new social impact start-up is making medical history, with one main goal – to make important new medicines accessible to more people around the world quickly and safely.

TheSocialMedwork is a fully licensed, regulated medicines intermediary and social enterprise with a mission to make newly developed medicines for life-threatening and debilitating conditions available as soon as they are approved by the first national authority anywhere in the world, a unique concept.

This allows patients in the UK (and around the Globe) access to vital medications, that are either not currently available or only recently developed, months and even years faster. They do this by working with people to import vital medicines for individual patient use.

TheSocialMedwork was created by Sjaak Vink (a Dutch entrepreneur, healthcare innovator and social activist) and Jamie Heywood (Founder and Chairman of the largest online patient community in the world - Patients Like Me), who were joined by Bernard Muller (himself an ALS patient and founder of Project MinE the biggest ALS genetic data collection programme ever created) and Katrin Schepp (Attorney at Law, who lost her father to cancer).

They all saw people close to them suffer from delays in access to new treatments and came together with one vision - to create a third way, a universal healthcare service that bridges the gaps in existing care for everyone, everywhere.

TheSocialMedwork founder Sjaak Vink, said: “Delays between first approval and availability for new drugs can be months to years and this will certainly only increase in the wake of a no-deal Brexit."

"Jamie Heywood and I both sadly lost friends and family members due to the inaccessibility of new medicines and no one else should have to suffer because of bureaucracy and arbitrary decisions. Our pledge is to make medicines accessible to all people around the world at the same time and to deliver the lowest public prices possible. We believe that health is the most critical human right, and this is something we’ll continue to champion.”

Working in accordance with the UK government’s Medicines & Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) TheSocialMedwork is unique in that it can legally help individual patients buy the latest medicines without needing to travel to another country for treatment. No other organisation is doing this today.

This is because TheSocialMedwork has the medicine intermediary licence and works with a number of pharmacy partners, which enables the company to buy and sell medicines within the EU for individual patient use. This licence was created in the Netherlands by law in 2012, implemented from an EU Directive and Dutch company TheSocialMedwork made medical history by becoming one of the first holders of this licence and the first and only organisation using it to support individual patient importation.

Typically, wholesalers, who currently act as the main suppliers of clinics, hospitals and other medical care providers, and pharmaceutical companies are not allowed to sell medicines to individuals and this is where TheSocialMedwork fills an essential gap in the market.

TheSocialMedwork works by helping people in the UK import medicines for their own use - under the individual patient use regulations enshrined in British law. A prescription from a treating doctor is required with every order and only medicines that are unavailable in the UK can be purchased. This means, literally, a patient cannot get hold of the medicines through the existing medical procedures (doctor, hospital, pharmacy).

The service taps into a large unserviced demand because doctors are allowed to prescribe any medicine that they think provides the best treatment option to their patient. Many believe they are even obliged to choose the best one because of the principles behind the Hippocratic Oath, which drives medical best practice to this day.

According to the MHRA there is no requirement for a member of the public to notify them of the importation of medicines for personal use and legislation does not restrict such importation. Consequently, no licence, certificate or authorisation is issued to or needed by recipients. The person receiving the medication needs to have a prescription and letter from a resident doctor stating the name of the patient and the intended use and that the supply of medicine is only for 3-6 months.

TheSocialMedwork sources medicines from GDP compliant suppliers across the world but tends to work with new medicines that hold the most value for patients. However, TheSocialMedwork can work to source any medicine (as long as it's not a generic) that a patient needs and cannot yet access in the UK on request.

A current topical example of this is the migraine prevention drug; erenumab (trade name Aimovig). Erenumab is not expected to be made available on the NHS until 2019, but patients can order today via TheSocialMedwork if they have a prescription from their doctor. The medication would be delivered in around 12 days. Other relevant UK examples include lumacaftor/ivacaftor (Orkambi) for cystic fibrosis and ocrelizumab (Ocrevus) for primary progressive multiple sclerosis.

TheSocialMedwork guarantees delivery in accordance with regulations and with the highest medical standards so that the patient, their family and the treating doctors can focus on medical care.

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