About Life Sciences Law
Lexis®+ Life Sciences is an online practical guidance product for contentious and non-contentious lawyers providing advice to and supporting the UK’s Life Sciences sector.
Research and development
Highly regulated, with strict compliance rules, work can be in-house or in collaboration with another entity. Guidance includes practice notes on UK and EU regime for clinical trials and various precedents.
Intellectual property
Patents and supplementary protection certificates are significant to many life sciences businesses. We have practice notes on pharmaceutical patents, biotechnology patents, IP protection for medical devices and more.
Medicinal products
This content includes guidance on marketing authorisations, orphan and paediatric medicines, pharmacovigilance, manufacturing, unlicensed and off-label medicines.
Medical devices
Covering key areas of medical devices regulation including classification, conformity assessments, clinical and performance evaluation as well as post-market surveillance.
Topics We Cover
Latest Life Sciences News
The European Commission has introduced the competitiveness compass, a strategic framework aimed at guiding the Commission's work for the next five...
The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has updated its guidance for the review of new requests for scientific advice meetings....
On 28 November 2024, the European Medicines Agency (EMA)’S Pharmacovigilance Risk Assessment Committee adopted new guidelines on the use of specific...
This week's edition of Life Sciences weekly highlights includes news that the European Health Data Space Regulation, aimed at enhancing cross-border...
The World Health Organization (WHO) has released a draft guideline aimed at improving the development of better-quality, age-appropriate medicines for...
Latest Life Sciences Practice Notes
UK GDPR—the public sectorThis Practice Note provides a summary of how the application of the United Kingdom General Data Protection Regulation,...
Sunsetting retained EU law—essentialsRetained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Act 2023The Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Act 2023 (REUL(RR)A...
Outsourcing and data protectionIn briefData protection laws in the UK seek to ensure information about living individuals (within the definition of...
Life sciences cases tracker—EUThis Practice Note is intended to be used to track the progress of EU cases relevant to the life sciences sector.Jump...
Life sciences tracker—EUThis Practice Note is intended to be used to track the progress of EU legislative proposals and current consultations relevant...
Latest Life Sciences Precedents
Template agreement—mutualThis Agreement is made on [date]Parties1[insert name of Party A][ of OR a company incorporated in [England and Wales] under...
Confidentiality letter—know-how[insert address of sender]Our ref: [insert reference]Your ref: [insert reference][Insert address of recipient]Date:...
Confidentiality letter—private M&A—asset purchase—corporate sellerStrictly private and confidentialTo: [insert buyer name][insert buyer address]Date:...
Confidentiality letter—private M&A—share purchase—corporate sellerStrictly private and confidentialTo: [insert buyer name][insert buyer address]Date:...
Confidentiality agreement—corporate joint ventureThis Agreement is made on [insert day and month] 20[insert year]Parties1[Insert name of first...
Latest Life Sciences Q&As
Featured Life Sciences content
The regulation of medical devices in the UK
The regulation of medical devices in the UKThis Practice Note provides an overview of the UK regulatory regime for medical devices. It explains the...
Regulation of e-cigarettes
Regulation of e-cigarettes31 December 2020 marked the end of the Brexit implementation period following the UK’s decision to withdraw from the EU. At...
Clinical evaluation and performance evaluation of medical devices in the EU
Clinical evaluation and performance evaluation of medical devices in the EUThis Practice Note describes key changes to the requisite clinical...
Unlicensed medicinal products and off-label use of medicinal products
Unlicensed medicinal products and off-label use of medicinal productsThis Practice Note explores unlicensed medicinal products and the various ways...
Second and subsequent medical use patent claims
Second and subsequent medical use patent claimsBackground to medical use claimsSecond (and subsequent) medical use patent claims are specific to the...
Post-market surveillance of medical devices in the EU
Post-market surveillance of medical devices in the EUPost-market surveillance is the monitoring by manufacturers of medical devices to ensure their...
Intellectual property protection for medical devices
Intellectual property protection for medical devicesChanges to intellectual property (IP) law from 1 January 2021Before discussing how intellectual...
Medicines and Medical Devices Act 2021
Medicines and Medical Devices Act 2021This Practice Note provides an overview of the Medicines and Medical Devices Act 2021 (MMDA 2021) which, in...
Introduction to borderline products
Introduction to borderline productsThis Practice Note provides an introduction to the concept of borderline products, how the regulatory status of...
Clinical Research Organisation (CRO) master services agreement
Clinical Research Organisation (CRO) master services agreementDATA PROTECTION NOTICE: Please note that the drafting of clause 7 (Data Protection), in...
Pharmacovigilance
PharmacovigilancePharmacovigilance is the process of collecting and understanding information relating to the adverse effects of medicinal product...
The UK medical devices regime and the impact of the Northern Ireland Protocol
Life Sciences analysis: Peter Rudd-Clarke, partner, and Anna Lundy, associate director, at Osborne Clarke discuss how the medical device industry is...
Medical devices due diligence questionnaire
Medical devices due diligence questionnaireIntroductionThis medical devices regulatory due diligence questionnaire relates to the proposed purchase by...
Life Sciences weekly highlights—11 August 2022
This week's edition of Life Sciences weekly highlights includes analysis of the English court’s jurisdiction to decide COVID-related business...
The regulation of advanced therapy medicinal products
The regulation of advanced therapy medicinal productsThe development of medicine, biomicrobiology and biotechnology has led to the emergence of a...
The experimental use and Bolar-type exemptions to patent infringement
The experimental use and Bolar-type exemptions to patent infringementPatent systems are intended to foster innovation, not to impede it. For this...
Life Sciences weekly highlights—18 August 2022
This week's edition of Life Sciences weekly highlights includes consideration of the arguments put forward against DeepMind, Google’s subsidiary, for...
Pharma and medical device regulation—Colombia—Q&A guide
Pharma and medical device regulation—Colombia—Q&A guideThis Practice Note contains a jurisdiction-specific Q&A guide to pharma and medical device...
Associated legal terms
Accelerated assessment
Many countries offer a regulatory pathway that will expedite the evaluation of certain medicinal products so that they reach patients faster. In the EU, the accelerated assessment procedure reduces the timeframe for the European Medicines Agency’s (EMA) Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) to review a marketing authorisation (MA) application from 210 to 150 evaluation days. Applications may be eligible for accelerated assessment if the CHMP decides the product is of major interest for public health and therapeutic innovation. In the UK, the Medicines and Healthcare Regulatory Agency (MHRA) offers a 150-day assessment timeline for all high-quality new MA applications in an effort to accelerate the availability of new medicines for patients in the UK. The MHRA evaluates the application for a UK, Great Britain (England, Wales and Scotland) or Northern Ireland MA and reaches its opinion on whether to approve the licensing of new medicines within 150 days of submission of a valid application. See also: marketing authorisation (MA).
Off label
The intentional use of an authorised medicinal product outside the terms of its authorisation'>marketing authorisation (e.g. for a different indication, different dose or in a different patient population). It is considered off-label use of a medical device if the device is used differently from how the manufacturer has instructed.
Orphan medicinal product
A medicinal product that is used to prevent, diagnose or treat a rare medical condition or disease. In the EU, according to Regulation (EC) 141/2000, a disease is defined as rare if it affects fewer than 5 in 10,000 people across the EU.
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