£80m treatment fund ‘speeds up’ access to medicines for patients in Wales

An £80m treatment fund has ‘significantly reduced’ the time taken for newly recommended treatment to become available to patients in Wales, cutting the wait from 90 days to 13.

First launched in 2017, the New Treatment Fund provides health boards with financial assistance to speed up access to life-prolonging and improving medicines. The fund now covers 226 medicines for over 100 conditions.

One drug now available through the fund, following approval by NICE and the All Wales Medicines Strategy Group, is Palbociclib, a targeted therapy used to block the spread and growth of cancer.

Andrew Evans, chief pharmaceutical officer for Wales, said the medicines “affect the quality of life of people with a range of medical conditions.”

He went on to explain that a drug becoming available to patients is “quite a long process” that necessitates a series of clinical trials followed by a licensing process before being appraised by NICE and the All Wales Medicines Strategy Group.

Health Minister Vaughan Gething, said the fund was “delivering precisely what we intended it to do. It is enabling us to transform the way healthcare is delivered.

“For some patients these medicines are life saving, for others they are bringing significant improvements to their lives.”

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Posted by Tony May, Partner/head of Clinical Negligence Department, Chadwick Lawrence LLP (tonymay@chadlaw.co.uk ), medical negligence lawyers and clinical negligence solicitors in Huddersfield, Leeds, Wakefield and Halifax, West Yorkshire.

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