Medicines Repurposing Program Opens - Call for Candidate Medicine Nominations : MTPConnect

06 March 2024

The Australian Government Department of Health and Aged Care has commenced a new Medicines Repurposing Program (MRP) to expand treatment options and improve health outcomes for Australians.

The MRP will identify new uses for existing medicines registered on the Australian Register of Therapeutic Goods (ARTG). It aims to facilitate and encourage the ARTG registration and consideration by the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee (PBAC) for listings on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS).

More information on the Medicines Repurposing Program is available on the TGA website.

Identification of potential medicines suitable for repurposing

The program will work with clinicians, health organisations, patient groups, researchers, pharmaceutical companies and other interested members of the public to identify opportunities for repurposing.

Individuals and organisations, can propose new uses for existing medicines, supported by accepted clinical practice and/or publicly available literature, through the nomination form. The program is encouraging nominations with a clear public health benefit substantiated by evidence of established clinical practice.

Submit your candidate medicine nomination

The program is now open for nominations via the candidate nomination form.

Nominations will be assessed in batches on a rolling basis to allow review of eligible medicines at the Advisory Committee on Medicines (ACM) meetings which are held at regular intervals. While there is no cut-off date for nomination submission, nominations submitted by Wednesday, 17 April 2024 will be considered at the June 2024 ACM meeting. Eligible candidate nominations received after 17 April 2024 will be presented at subsequent ACM meetings.

Program overview webinars in March

The program is hosting webinars for interested parties, focusing on the candidate nomination process.

The webinar, Medicines Repurposing: a program to support new clinical uses of existing medicines, is scheduled twice, for 11:00-11:30pm AEDT Tuesday 12 March and 2:00-2:30pm AEDT Tuesday 19 March 2024.

Please note that the content being presented at both Medicines Repurposing webinars will be the same.