About pre-ICH and ICH formats of the WHO-DD dictionary

The format of the WHO‑DD C dictionary files was changed for compliance with the ICH guidelines for drug dictionaries. The Central Coding application ships with the control files for both the pre-ICH and ICH dictionary formats. You can load either format of the WHO‑DD dictionary for use in the Central Coding application.

ICH format—An ICH version of the WHO-DD dictionary is one released in or after March 2006.
The control files for the ICH version of the dictionary are stored in two locations:
- <Installation Folder>\Dictionary Loader\bin\setup\control files\whodd
- <Installation Folder>\Dictionary Loader\bin\setup\control files\whodd\ICH
The Central Coding application is set up by default to use the ICH version of the WHO‑DD dictionary. Therefore, if you want to use this dictionary format, no changes to the control files are required.
Pre-ICH format—A pre-ICH version of the WHO-DD dictionary is one released prior to March 2006.
The control files for the pre-ICH version of the dictionary are stored in:
- <Installation Folder>\Dictionary Loader\bin\setup\control files\whodd\Pre-ICH
If you want to use this dictionary format, you must copy the control files to a different directory.

For more information, see Loading a pre-ICH version of the WHO‑DD dictionary.