A note from the Commissoner

I would like to introduce myself as the Acting Commissioner of the Pharmaceutical Advertising Advisory Board (PAAB). Over the past 17 years at PAAB I’ve had the roles of Deputy Commissioner, Chief Review Officer, and Reviewer. I am honoured to now have the privilege of working with our stakeholders in this new capacity.

First and foremost, I’d like to pay tribute to our previous Commissioner, Ray Chepesiuk. Ray has demonstrated great leadership in driving PAAB toward its vision. I am eager to build on the success that PAAB has experienced under his watch.

In 2019, one of my key priorities will be to promote stakeholder engagement. To that end, we’ll soon be creating advisory committees to incorporate the client perspective into our planning for upcoming PAAB initiatives. We’ll be promoting these opportunities for client involvement as they become available. However, if you’d prefer to make sure you don’t miss these invitations, feel free to reach out to me at patrickm@paab.ca to get your name added to our registry of candidates. Tell me a bit about yourself so that I can ensure you are placed in the committee that best fits your interest and expertise.

Upcoming PAAB initiatives cover a wide breadth of topics from continuous improvement of the preclearance journey to building additional connections with healthcare professionals and patient groups. Participation on advisory committees will generally involve two or three 1-hour web conference calls. Volunteers will be acknowledged in launch communications pertaining to the initiative. I’d appreciate your support towards the realization of our vision of being a worldclass leader in supporting truthful advertising of healthcare products.

Please feel free to contact me directly at patrickm@paab.ca with any organizational questions about the PAAB or to share any insights on how we can best work together on promoting high standards in drug advertising.

Patrick Massad

Acting PAAB Commissioner