Cancer drug 'is prolonging lives'

By Michele Paduano BBC Midlands Today health correspondent

Those given the drugs lived on average for a further 22 months

Researchers have said kidney cancer sufferers given so-called "post code lottery" drugs live 15 months longer on average than those denied them.

People in Birmingham can receive sutent and nexovar on the NHS but patients in Warwickshire and Worcestershire cannot.

University Hospital, Birmingham, found patients given the drugs lived for a further 22 months on average but those denied them lived for seven months.

The NHS said it would study the hospital's findings.

The hospital's audit was based on a group of 79 patients.

Cost effective

It found that 81% of patients treated with the new drugs are still alive compared to just 33% who were not given them.

Both drugs are currently being investigated by the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (Nice), which decides whether drugs can be made available on the NHS.

Currently local primary care trusts (PCTs) decide whether a drug is cost effective enough to be offered on the NHS.

University Hospital said it was in a good position to study the affect of the drugs because it treated patients from different PCTs across the Midlands.

Professor Nick James, an oncology specialist, said: "They were all managed by the same doctors as part of the same clinic so any differences in their outcome, as far as we can tell from this audit, are down to the drug and not down to anything else."

A Nice spokesman said it had received the University Hospital study on Wednesday and would be "taken into consideration".

A spokesman added: "No further comment can be made ahead of the final appraisal. A further response will be issued on the work as part of the final appraisal."

E-mail this to a friend

Printable version