The Primary Care Medicine Studies Group (EMAP) is a research group accredited by IDIAPJGol and AGAUR. Its main objective is to conduct excellence-driven research on the use of medicines in the field of Primary Care.
We are an interdisciplinary group with expertise in carrying out studies using diverse methodologies. The main research lines are interconnected and fall within two major areas:
• Pharmacoepidemiological and pharmacovigilance studies using large databases focused on assessing drug effectiveness and safety under real-world conditions and in understudied populations such as children, polymedicated patients, pregnancy, breastfeeding, and the elderly.
• Prospective studies involving patient inclusion, mainly clinical trials with medicines and medical devices that meet the specific needs of Primary Care, using pragmatic designs that emulate clinical practice while generating new scientific evidence and facilitating knowledge transfer to healthcare.
EMAP participates in the development of independent clinical trials through management, monitoring, and pharmacovigilance activities. In this regard, the group is part of the SCReN network (Spanish Clinical Research Network). We are also part of the SIGMA Consortium, responsible for providing scientific evidence in pharmacoepidemiology using European databases, together with research on drug use during pregnancy (ConcePTION) and pharmacovigilance of COVID-19 vaccines (VAC4EU). The group also supports the Catalan Therapeutic Harmonization Program (CatSalut) and the Catalonia Pharmacovigilance Centre through the Technical Office of Pharmacoepidemiology, studying real-world drug use. In addition, we collaborate with other networks such as CIBER, RICAPPS, ECRAID and EU PE&PV Research Network.
The multidisciplinary nature of the group—comprising researchers in pharmacoepidemiology and pharmacovigilance, data managers, statisticians, pharmacologists specialized in pharmacovigilance, project managers, clinical research associates, and qualitative research specialists—enables the achievement of its objectives due to the diverse expertise of its members.
