Macmillan Cancer Support slams too-slow Primary Care Trusts

8:00am Monday 10th November 2008

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MACMILLAN Cancer Support is on the warpath over the time it takes health authorities to answer pleas from cancer sufferers for new drugs that could prolong their lives.

It claims that only half of Primary Care Trusts (PCTs) in England make a decision to fund the drugs within one month – and for many people, that decision comes too late as their condition would have deteriorated and the use of any new drug would be futile.

Macmillan is now calling for decision making on funding for last-chance cancer treatment to be speeded up and for patients to be told they have a chance to appeal.

It also wants cancer specialists to sit on panels making decisions and an end to the “postcode lottery” deciding who does and does not get the drugs.

Herefordshire PCT confirmed that between April last year and March this year, it received 208 requests for special funding for drugs to treat illnesses, although not all were for cancer treatments.

Each one was considered by the trust’s Named Patient Panel (NPP) and, while it approved 53% of requests, 47% were rejected, all at the first hearing.

The trust said the vast majority of cases were decided within four weeks and those delayed were because of “incomplete clinical information”.

A statement by Herefordshire PCT said there were two medical qualified doctors on its NPP panel, they worked closely with consultants of different specialities, including cancer and decisions were largely informed by the specialist’s advice.

All patients were told they could appeal if their requests were turned down The trust had a clear policy in dealing with individual funding requests and there were regular audits and reports to the PCT board, ensuring transparency of the process.