WHO Model Formulary

In 1995 the WHO Expert Committee on the Use of Essential Drugs recommended that WHO develop a Model Formulary which would complement the WHO Model List of Essential Drugs (the ‘Model List’). It was considered that such a Model Formulary would be a useful resource for countries wishing to develop their own national formulary. The first edition of the Model Formulary was issued in August 2002.

It has proved difficult in practice to maintain in the Model Formulary the section headings and numbering system of the Model List. The main reason was that the sections of the Model List are not always useful as therapeutic categories, and do not easily lend themselves to introductory evaluative statements. Small changes were therefore introduced. The Model Formulary has also repeated information about essential medicines under other relevant therapeutic categories. The small differences between the classification of the Model List and of the Model Formulary should not be a major problem for users who can access information through the contents list or through the main index, which includes both drug names and disease terms. The Model List and the Model Formulary are available electronically on the WHO Essential Medicines Library website; search facilities and links between the Model Formulary and the Model List provide easy access to relevant

information. The electronic version of the Model Formulary is also available on CD-ROM, intended as a starting point for developing national or institutional formularies. National or institutional committees can use the text of the Model Formulary for their own needs by adapting the text, or by adding or deleting entries to align the formulary to their own list of essential medicines.

The Model Formulary has been translated into Arabic, Russian and Spanish. This edition of the Model Formulary is fully compatible with the 14th WHO Model List of Essential Medicines as recommended by the WHO Expert Committee on the Selection and Use of Essential Medicines at its meeting of March 2005. For a list of the more significant changes in this edition see Changes to the WHO Model List of Essential Medicines. This edition was again prepared in close collaboration between the WHO Department of Essential Drugs and Medicines Policy and the editorial team of the British National Formulary.

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