ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Center for Drug Evaluation and Research

The Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER) is like a big office that looks at all the medicines that people want to sell in the United States. They make sure that medicines are safe to take and actually work for the sickness or disease they are meant to treat.

It's kind of like when you brush your teeth and your mom or dad looks over your shoulder to make sure you're doing it right. Just like your mom or dad wants to make sure you have clean teeth, the people at the CDER want to make sure that the medicines you take help you get better and not make you worse.

The CDER team includes lots of people who are very smart and know a lot about medicines, like doctors, scientists, and other healthcare professionals. They carefully review all the information about new medicines before they are allowed to be sold in the United States.

Their job is to make sure that the companies that want to sell a medicine have done tests to make sure it's safe for people to take. They also check to make sure that the medicine actually works for the kind of sickness or disease it's supposed to treat.

So, if your doctor prescribes a medicine for you to take, you can feel safe knowing that the people at the CDER have looked at it and made sure it's safe and will work the way it's supposed to.