One in six cancer patients get drugs late – or not at all
CANCER drugs are not reaching the patients who need them, experts warn.
One in six people diagnosed with cancer have faced problems getting the drugs recommended by their doctors, according to a report by the Institute of Cancer Research.
NHS rationing, red tape and hold-ups mean 16 per cent of patients have either faced delays getting treatments or been denied them altogether, polling by the organisation found.
The cancer specialists – who today publish a ten-point manifesto calling for action to improve access to drugs – say the high price of modern treatments and inflexibility of NHS watchdog NICE are at the heart of the problem. Professor Paul Workman, chief executive of the ICR, said: ‘We will only make advances against cancer by giving patients access to genuinely innovative new drugs.
‘We need drug regulators and NICE to be faster and more flexible in their assessment of evidence, especially for the most innovative treatments. And it’s crucial to address the extremely high prices of cancer drugs.’
Scientists are coming up with increasingly advanced ways of tackling cancer – but delays in the drug development and regulatory systems mean it can be years before NHS patients get them.
This means people with cancer pay the price, because patients do better when they are given access to the best treatments as early as possible. In many cases, the NHS only makes treatments available months or even years after they have been approved in the US and other countries. And even when they are approved, the most innovative drugs are often reserved for patients who have tried and failed cheaper treatments.
The ICR polled 1,000 cancer patients about their treatment. A fifth had tried to enrol in clinical trials of new treatments – but only just over half of those had been accepted.
Patients said they had major concerns about the role of pharmaceutical companies, with only 12 per cent believing they are doing well at delivering new medicines. They added that the high prices charged by the companies were the biggest barrier to gaining access to new drugs – with 70 per cent saying the prices charged were ‘much too high’.
Professor Raj Chopra, of the ICR, said: ‘We need to see all cancer patients reap the benefits of research through access to innovative treatments, irrespective of what cancer they have, how old they are or where they live in the country. It’s only by encouraging innovation that we can make big leaps forward.’
The ICR called for a shake-up of the ‘ cost- effectiveness’ model used by NICE to assess new drugs. It calculates the cost of giving a patient an extra ‘quality’ year of life. If the cost is deemed to be above £30,000, or £50,000 for seriously ill patients, it is not funded.
Meindert Boysen, of NICE, said: ‘Providing patients with access to innovative cancer treatments that are clinically and cost-effective is NICE’s highest priority.
‘With our processes becoming even more efficient in the last few years, this has resulted in getting cancer drugs which are clinically and cost- effective to those who need them faster than ever before.’
‘Extremely high prices’