After a consultation on changes to its methods for appraising health technologies, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) has gone public with its way forward. As discussed previously, the consultation sought views on four items: Introduce a “fast track” NICE technology appraisal process for the most promising new technologies, which fall below an incremental cost […]
The recent proposals by NICE and NHS England to change arrangements for evaluating and funding drugs and other health technologies not only tidy up the processes, but introduce some important new elements. The four proposed elements are to: Introduce a “fast track” NICE technology appraisal process for the most promising new technologies, which fall below an […]
A terrible beauty: A short history of the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence by Nicholas Timmins, Michael Rawlins and John Appleby. Free download. This story of NICE is a great read. The main author Nick Timmins, a former journalist for the Financial Times, now with the Kings Fund, tells a thriller like story […]
Conflict of interest: the proposals reviewed here are similar to those advocated in a 2014 BMJ editorial “Reforming the Cancer Drugs Fund” to which I was a co-author. I have had no involvement with the development of the proposed policy. The Cancer Drugs Fund continues to pose problems not least a rising spend, up from […]
Since Andrew Lansley announced in 2010 that the NHS would in future use “value based pricing” in its purchases of pharmaceuticals, civil servants and (more recently) the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) have been struggling to develop an approach for how this could be implemented. For the twists and turns, see previous blogs on the […]
A strong critique just published points to logical inconsistencies in NICE’s consideration of social values, specifically in how it handles quality adjusted life years (QALYs). Since these are key to many of the most controversial decisions made by NICE’s appraisal committees, this matters. It matters all the more that the authors include Tony Culyer, who […]
Recent headlines have indicated NICE’s displeasure at how it has been asked to implement value based pricing. The stories are based on a paper, “Value based assessment of health technologies,” which was considered by the NICE board on 22 January. The paper proposed two main changes: a) an alternative approach to the Wider Social Benefit […]
On 20 June the Department of Health announced that: “Expert body given responsibility to look at the benefits medicines bring to wider society.” The terms of reference are not on either the Department of Health’s nor NICE’s websites, but I requested and got a copy. Here is what they say: “ The methods for value […]
The response of the government to the House of Common’s health committee’s report on the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) has provided clarification both on value based pricing and NICE. The committee’s report, published in January 2013, expressed concern that arrangements for value based pricing due to be introduced in January 2014 […]
The publication of a summary of the benefits and harms of breast cancer screening in the Lancet, with the full report to follow, raises the question of whether referring this to NICE would have made any difference. The most obvious difference is that NICE would have gone on to appraise cost effectiveness. The final sentence […]