Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) is an EU and worldwide standard that was developed by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which is a United States agency that is responsible for approving medicines and foodstuffs and promoting health, which is implemented by the European Union member states. Its objective is to ensure the cleanliness, safety and high efficacy of medicinal products, medical devices and processes in place within the company.

GMP standards apply to the manufacturing process, staff qualifications, archiving analytical results and control and distribution processes. The system is based on three pillars: first: procedures, second: training, third: internal audits. Only when all of the three modules are in place is the system deemed fully implemented.

• Polpharma’s annual production: approx. 200 m containers with drugs that, arranged one after the other, would occupy one-third of the equator.
• The area of Polpharma’s solid form manufacturing facility is 25,000 sq m, or an area the size of three Olympic-size football fields.
• Polpharma sponsors men’s basketball team in Starogard Gdański, which competes with the best teams in the Polish premier league. The team players are called “Kociewie Devils”.

The ingredients of our diet can interact with the drugs that we take and lead to various health problems. Therefore, pharmacists should inform patients about such interactions.

1. Foods with high fat content may increase the absorption of antidepressants, such as diazepam, oxazepam, nitrazepam and alprazolam, which may lead to decreased blood pressure, headache, awareness disturbances and seizures. This also applies to antihypertensives, such as indapamide, enalapril and amlodipine, as well as antidepressants (amitriptyline and imipramine) whose levels in the blood may be excessive.
2. Antiparasitic drugs taken with fatty foods may lead to dizziness, skin lesions and even hair loss. Patients who use these drugs should not take them with fatty foods (butter, bacon, sausage or cream).
3. Patients with respiratory infections sometimes buy an antibiotic and grapefruit seed extract in a pharmacy and take them simultaneously, adding prescription and OTC drugs. Please be reminded that after consuming any grapefruit product, including the juice, drugs may only be taken after about four hours. The juice, which is rich in vitamins and flavonoids, when combined with antihistamines, for example, may lead to life-threatening cardiac arrhythmias.
4. Diuretics, such as furosemide, should not be combined with salty foods, as they retain body water.
5. Fiber in whole wheat bread, bran or porridge may block the absorption of important drugs, such as antiarrhythmic agents. Cardiac complaints may return; therefore, patients who take for example cardiac glycosides, anticonvulsants that contain phenytoin, procainamide (antiarrhythmic drug) or antidepressants must remember not to use them with incompatible foods.
6. Hard cheese, such as brie, overripe avocadoes and bananas, smoked fish, chicken liver and some wines combined with antituberculous drugs, such as isoniazide, antibacterial drugs, such as furazolidone, or antidepressants may cause dangerous hypertensive crises with strong headache, palpitations, hypertension, and even collapse and coma. They inhibit an enzyme that degrades tyramine, which is an ingredient of these foodstuffs. Its high blood level may be life-threatening.