Announcements           

• PAAB Fees as of April 3^rd, 2023: As per the ARO Planner Features Detailer originally published in Nov of 2021 and the website fee schedule, the PAAB has adjusted the fees to account for inflation. The fees as of April 2023 can be found here. All fees are exclusive of HST.
• Real World Evidence (RWE) Update: The first draft of the RWE document has been circulated for industry consultation. PAAB will consolidate comments and the expert RWE Committee will assess the feedback to determine if changes are required. Updates will be posted to the PAAB Forum thread RWE Committee Updates. Please follow for timely updates.
• Burden of Disease Draft Guidance: PAAB has distributed a draft guidance on proposed changes to our approach to presentations of disease burden within advertising. If you would like to provide comments, please reach out to Pauline Dong. As a reminder, draft documents are confidential and should not be shared outside your organization.
• Creative Imagery Committee: PAAB has formed a committee of industry experts to assess the use of creative imagery in advertising and evaluate the need for additional guidance and clarity. Learn more.
• Customer Experience Index (CEI): The CEI launched on February 13, 2023. Since then, we have sent out over 899 surveys and have received over 146 responses for an overall completion rate of 16.2%. Based on feedback from agencies, we have added a “My CEI Survey” dashboard page to the eFiles system to allow for quick access to the list of outstanding CEIs. You can access it through the “My CEI Surveys” tab in the top navigation of eFiles upon login. Please be aware that CEIs expire after two weeks. Once they have expired, they will no longer be available from your dashboard. If a CEI has expired before you have the chance to complete, please reach out to review@paab.ca. The metrics from the CEI will be used as part of our performance assessments and continuous improvement efforts. We strongly encourage you to fill out all of your CEIs to have your voice heard! If you have additional feedback, please reach out to Danielle Anthony via info@paab.ca.
• New reviewer titles: PAAB is pleased to introduce Danielle Anthony, Maxine Armstrong, Vivien Fong, Lucia Kim, Malika Ladha and Jehan Lalani-Carbone as Senior Reviewers. Please click here for the complete communication.

    New Documents

• Advisory – Provincial Formulary Coverage Statements
  • This document consolidates and summarizes updates to PAAB’s approach to formulary claims in APS.
• Gating Mechanism for HCP Digital Assets
  • On this page you will find a summary of two mechanisms we anticipate will be the most used forms of gating. Attached at the bottom of the page is a longer document covering additional mechanism options along with additional context. This guidance was created in collaboration with Health Canada to provide more guidance on “sufficient barriers” for digital assets.
• Advisory on Exclusivity Claims for Indications
  • This document defines a revised approach to exclusivity claims in relation to indications after further consultation with Health Canada.

    Q&A

    22 Forum questions from industry answered on topics such as:

• Indication exclusivity
• NOC/c and extensions
• In-vitro studies
• Gating
• Interim timepoints
• Samples
• Symptom tracker
• International conferences in Canada
• Secondary audiences
• DTC help-seeking messages in waiting rooms

    Myths vs. Facts

Keep an eye out for new “Myths vs. Facts” coming later this year and make sure you’re familiar with the common ones posted now so that your company isn’t falling into the “Myths” trap. Check out PAAB Myths page today.

Let us know if there are any myths you want clarification on, or for PAAB to help dispel for the industry.

    eFiles Tag Report

• The Year End PAAB Tag Report 2022 has been posted. We continue to encourage clients to use the tagging system to help PAAB identify areas of improvement and areas of valued service. As a reminder, the tickets are completely confidential. We look forward to your continued feedback moving into 2023. If you want more information on the tagging system, please see Client Tagging System Advisory.
• Coming in the Q1 PAAB Tag Report 2023 will be a section added to summarize the quarterly outcomes of the CEI.
• As a reminder: The CEI captures the overall experience with a file and the review process. It helps to impact macro processes and performance. The “tags” help us pinpoint cases where there was an event that could be assessed for learning purposes, checked for consistency or be used to implement change. This specific feedback helps us improve performance on a more granular level.