Our background

The European Union (EU) Competent Authorities for Medical Devices (CAMD) project was established to enhance collaborative working, communication and surveillance of medical devices across Europe.

CAMD is an umbrella group, under which the national competent authorities in the EU work to enhance the level of collaborative work in what is a single market for medical devices.

Our aims

Following the breast implant scandal in 2012, Commissioner John Dalli called for immediate action to be taken by EU Member States to ensure full and stringent implementation of current legislation on medical devices. His recommendations were set out in the PIP Action Plan, which sets out three main challenges:

• Enhance collaborative working
• Improve market surveillance
• Deliver better communication

The elected CAMD Executive Group is working closely with the European Commission to improve the strategic planning and the distribution of work across Commission-led and CAMD-led initiatives.

Our work

To meet these aims, CAMD will deliver a series of Joint Action projects which are designed to help EU Members States deliver on these commitments and develop better mechanisms for working together and sharing the workload.

The first of these Joint Actions was developed by the Compliance and Enforcement Network (COEN) and is led by Austria. This started in November 2015 and is due to be completed by December 2017.

CAMD is led by the CAMD Executive Group (CEG), which is made up of nine members: seven are elected, including the chair and deputy chairs; two are representatives from the current and next countries that are hosting the European Presidency. The CEG co-ordinates the development of Joint Actions and the work being undertaken by the associated Working Groups.