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Reply to my MP's PQ from Paul Burstow, Min. of State for Care Services at DoH

My MP has submitted a written PQ to both Paul Burstow and Andrew Lansley. Below I have posted the question and Paul Burstow's reply. Nothing yet from Lansley, but my MP has asked me to contact him if I have any concerns about the reply below and says he will send me Lansley's response when he gets one. (No doubt this will be the same standard letter as others on this site have received).

PQ "To ask the Secretary of State for Health what assessment his Department has made of the capability of the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence to carry out appraisals for innovative inhibitor therapies for rare cancers in instances where the target population is insufficient for the Institute's study criteria to be met."

Reply from Paul Burstow: "NICE has appraised, or is appraising, a number of inhibitor therapies for less common cancers. The potential size of the patient population is one consideration in determining whether NICE should develop guidance on a treatment. However, the overarching consideration is whether NICE guidance can add value in a particular case".

Does anyone on this site understand what the reply means? I would like to be optimistic regarding the second sentence of the reply, and suggest this means the Govt is also thinking that NICE needs to change its assessment criteria for cancers with small patient numbers but maybe that is wishful thinking. As my MP seems reasonably keen to follow this through, does anyone have any idea what, if anything I should write to him regarding the reply. (Apart from asking him what it means !!)

I am posting this as it seems slightly different from the standard reply others have already received,
Best wishes to all
Chrissie

What I sincerely hope this means is that they are wondering if spending a lot of money with various health statisticians at for example Exeter, Souhampton and West Midlands is value for money compared to the total cost of the drugs. Difficult to know how much the appraisals of Dasatinib and Nilotinib have cost per se, but the PENTAG team at Exeter are 2 years into a 5 year contract worth £3.4M to do treatment assessments (for many conditions and treatments) for NICE. Looking at the work involved in producing the PENTAG report in 2009 and the recent work from Southampton, we have to be in to several hundred thousand pounds at least, and we all know that the work is of very limited real value in the discussion, and the cash may well be better used funding drugs. I raised this point with my MP when I met him, and he saw were I was coming from, but I think the main value of it is not in actually evaluating the drugs, but in trying to negotiate price reductions (or"patient access schemes") with Novartis and BMS.