The government's kneejerk reaction to allow patients to top-up NHS care with treatment paid for privately is another nail in the coffin of the universal healthcare. We believe sanctioning top-ups is too simple an answer to a very thorny, complex and emotional issue, and doing so risks some serious unintended consequences. There is a danger that this might appease middle England but disregard the real health challenges facing us.
The NHS drugs watchdog has loosened the terms of approval for expensive treatments that extend life in patients with a short life expectancy. Drugs that would normally be ruled out of use on the NHS because they did not represent a cost effective use of resources are now more likely to be made available.
The UK government has quietly dropped a passage in the draft handbook to the NHS constitution that said that ministers had decided to give researchers the right to trawl medical records for research participants without the need for patients’ consent. Organisations that are charged with safeguarding patient confidentiality had objected strongly to a section in the draft handbook that said, "Patients can . . . expect that a health professional or a research professional who owes the same duty of confidentiality as a health professional may use care records, in confidence, to identify whether they are suitable to participate in approved clinical trials. Appropriate patients will be notified of opportunities to join in, and will be free to choose whether they wish to do so, after a full explanation."
The confidentiality of medical records is threatened by government plans to relax laws on data protection, doctors' leaders told the Guardian yesterday. Dr Hamish Meldrum, chairman of the British Medical Association, said the profession was "extremely concerned" about legislation tabled by Jack Straw, the justice secretary, which would allow the Department of Health to share information on NHS databases with other ministries and private companies.
NICE has introduced new criteria for appraising end of life treatments. James Raftery looks at how they might affect availability by applying them to previously refused drugs
The NHS's spending watchdog acted unlawfully when it decided to restrict access to drugs that could help thousands of older women with the bone-thinning disease osteoporosis, the high court ruled today. A judge ruled that the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) wrongly failed to disclose the economic reasoning behind a decision in October to restrict the supply of strontium ranelate, a drug manufactured by Servier laboratories under the brand name Protelos.
A lesbian couple have won the right to NHS treatment to help them have a baby after threatening to sue health chiefs. NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde (GGC) had denied Caroline Harris and Julie McMullan IVF treatment as they were not classified as an infertile couple. The health board said it had reviewed its position in light of regulations, including the Equality Act. The women, who were suing the health board for treatment costs, said they had not yet been offered a settlement. The couple were claiming £20,000 after unsuccessful private fertility treatment, which followed them being refused NHS help. They had taken their case to the Court of Session in Edinburgh and a judicial review of the decision was due to take place at a later date. The health board at first stood by its refusal, but it has now agreed to offer the couple treatment at an assisted conception unit.
A therapeutic programme hailed by ministers as a hi-tech, cost-effective solution to Britain's growing problem of depression and anxiety has been widely ignored by the NHS, leaving hundreds of thousands of people without access to treatment. Opposition politicians and charities have accused the government of creating a postcode lottery.