Legal regulation of the production and trade of medical devices and medical equipment in the EU and US: experience for Ukraine.

INTRODUCTION: The need for effective legal regulation of production and sale of medical products in Ukraine due to its social effect is obvious and requires a high level of clarity. The experience of more advanced countries in this area, given the way chosen by Ukraine to harmonize our laws with EU legislation, is certainly could be a useful source of information. The urgency of issues need further intensification of national legal reforms. Some key points on concept of legal regulation of abovementioned sphere is a base of this study.

MATERIAL AND METHODS: Legislation of Ukraine, European Union, United States of America, Guidelines, developed by European Commission & Food and Drug Administration's (FDA), recommendations represented by international voluntary group and scientific works. This article is based on dialectical, comparative, analytic, synthetic and comprehensive research methods.

DISCUSSION: This study provide a possibility to state that main difference of regulatory systems in EU and US is that the legal framework of the EU is more flexible. This flexibility is grounded on main principle that only basic quality requirements for medical devices is defined by legislative acts however more detailed requirements are defined in standards, technical regulations, specifications, which are discretionary in nature. Contractors are free to choose any technical solution that provides compliance with the essential requirements, they can choose among different conformity assessment procedures and between accredited conformity assessment bodies to which they want to apply. The contractors themselves is interested to pass the conformity assessment procedure and have the right to put a conformity mark on their medical device because it will give them a real competitive advantage. In contrast, US State regulatory system provides strict control over business entities and law act establishes the quality requirements of medical products. The only body that can authorize the introduction of medical products and perform post-market monitoring is Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which has almost unlimited competence in this sphere.

CONCLUSION: Taking into account further deepening of the European integration process of Ukraine, establishing of the regulatory system as much similar to that of the EU as possible is a main goal of legal reforms in abovementioned sphere. On the one hand, such system allows to implement effective control of contractors in the sphere of production and sale of medical products and provide safety of medical devices that are introduced, on the other hand, it does not afflict contractors with excessive and total control, allowing them to choose behavior that is most acceptable, understandable and user-specific. However, US's experience also has some positive characteristics, which could be taken into account. Therefore, such complex symbiosis of approaches from our point of view will balance controversial interest of manufacturers, sellers and consumers of medical devices.