About CPL

Innovative Australian and New Zealand supply chain for clinical trials.

CPL is a supply chain company with the core of its service “Direct-To-Patient model” allowing for IP to be delivered and administered in the patient’s home.

As the DTP model allows the patient to participate in the clinical trial from home, it reduces the need for them to travel to the investigator site, increasing study recruitment and retention whilst reducing costs for the sponsor.

Our Chief Executive Officer,
Rima Darwiche

B Pharm BSc (Hons)

Our Chief Executive Officer and founder Rima, a registered Pharmacist, with 2 decades of experience across all phases (I-IV) of clinical research in both industry and investigator-driven trials. She’s been implementing clinical studies in collaboration with pharmaceutical companies from around the world since 2005.

Before working in pharmaceuticals, Rima was a medical researcher giving her the breadth and scope of medical experience to add a different perspective to the roll-out of clinical drug trials.

Rima is actively involved in several clinical trial advisory and steering committees both locally and globally and represents APAC for a Clinical Regulatory Group in the USA. Rima is also a voting member on DSMB (Data Safety Monitoring Board) for several clinical trials in Australia.

Our Company

The typical clinical trial model revolves around the investigational site, usually a clinical trial hospital pharmacy or in a corner of a hospital’s pharmacy.  The investigational product (IP) is usually stored at these locations awaiting patient recruitment to the trial. Meanwhile, patients can be limited by challenging diseases/disabilities to participate in a trial.

Our extensive experience working in collaboration with pharmaceutical companies, Contract Research Organisations, and medical research institutes, has enabled us to take the traditional and  centralised clinical drugs trials process and create Central Pharmacy Logistics, a clinical drug trials service set up to provide a revolutionary Direct-To-Patient delivery and Direct-From-Patient collection service.

CPL Licences

  • Pharmacy Licence (3058034- 151108)
  • GMP (Good Manufacturing Practice) 
    • CPL are licenced by the Therapeutic Goods Administration to perform the manufacturing steps for primary and secondary packaging, storage, labelling, and release for the supply of therapeutic goods (licence number: MI-2020-LI-13029-1)
  • Drugs and Poisons Licence – Licenced to store medicines in Schedules 2, 3, 4, and 8 & 9

Common Questions

Direct to Patient is considered a type of “Decentralised Trial” (DCT) as trials are conducted at locations outside the investigator site such as patient’s home, workplace, travel destination. This reduces the need for the patient to travel to the investigator site.

One of the main supply chain risks of a DTP trial are shipping coordination and logistics. With DTP the delivery of the IP is patient-facing which introduces challenges with delivery, timing of nursing visit and patient privacy.  This is why CPL needs to be involved for project management of each patient from dispensing to delivery and administration of the IP in a safe, secure and confidential process.

No longer do your recruited patients need to travel into a hospital or a clinic to receive an infusion or monitored trial. With CPL, this can take place in the comfort of a patient’s home. This is especially helpful in a place like Australia with a huge regional and remote spread of patients.

This model ultimately leads to a higher patient retention rate as the convenience means the participant is more willing to stay committed to the trial. Higher retention means greater amounts of data, earlier trial completion, and significant cost savings.

CPL is licensed to supply Investigational Product (IP) directly to a patient/participant (wherever they may be in Australia) and GMP/GCP trained Pharmacists are responsible and accountable for the dispensing of the IP to the patient. We use trained premium couriers for shipping of dispensed IP to patient’s homes to maintain safety, security, and confidentiality.

Our Melbourne-based depot is 10 minutes from Melbourne’s international airport, The depot is operated and owned by Australian pharmacists experienced in clinical trials. We use GMP/GCP trained pharmacists who are responsible and accountable for storing IP and dispensing IP to patients. Our Depot is TGA licenced, controlled environmental conditions, and secure with security checkpoints and barriers to prevent access to unauthorized persons and around the clock CCTV surveillance. The GMP compliant warehouse is temperature monitored with a back-up generator. Only DTP trained premium couriers are used for the distribution of IP to patients’ homes.