Postcode lottery leaving cancer patients without vital new drug treatments
CANCER patients are being denied drugs which could add years to their lives because of a postcode lottery for treatment.
A third of patients have been turned down for drugs by Scotland’s biggest health board, Greater Glasgow and Clyde.
The policy has forced Jean MacDonald, who is battling ovarian cancer, to raid her life savings and pay £38,000 for the drug Avastin to get a potential extra nine months of life with her family.
At the same time, other boards in Scotland have granted almost 100 per cent of requests for drugs not available on the NHS. Patients south of the Border can turn to the Cancer Drugs Fund for help.
A Scottish Daily Mail investigation found NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde refused 105 out of 308 patients drugs over three years. These include all medications – including those for cancer – which are not prescribed on the NHS and have not been
‘Where you live should not mean life or death’
recommended through the Scottish Medicines Consortium.
In Tayside, only 19 of 129 requests for drugs were turned down, while Forth Valley rejected only two out of 30.
Charities have criticised the disparity, which saw Miss MacDonald, 55, pay for treatment, which i s granted i n the Lothians area – and also subsequently by her own health board to other women.
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon last week visited the full-time carer after her case was raised in the Scottish parliament.
Miss MacDonald said: ‘It felt unfair that in my area I could not get the drug I needed when I might have done if I lived somewhere else.’
Alexandra Holden, director of communications for Target Ovarian Cancer, said: ‘Avastin is the first new treatment for ovarian cancer in 20 years and can prolong the survival of ovarian cancer patients in those who have the highest risk of the disease recurring, so we are extremely disap- pointed that women in Scotland continue to be unable to access it.
‘It is essential that women in Scotland, and their families, are given every opportunity to survive ovarian cancer.’
The Scotland-wide figures show that 82 per cent of patient treatment requests f or drugs were approved in 2013-14. More patients are being granted their requests and the application system has been overhauled, replacing individual patient treatment requests with a peer-approved clinical system.
But i n 2013- 14 more than a quarter of pleas from patients were rejected by NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde for medications includ- ing Avastin and cetuximab, a bowel cancer drug which can shrink patients’ tumours.
While NHS Forth Valley approved all seven of its applications, including for patients with leukaemia and Parkinson’s disease, Greater Glasgow and Clyde denied pleas by two breast cancer patients.
It refused to pay for the drug eribulin, which can prolong the lives of patients by almost three months, and everolimus, which slows down a cancer’s growth.
James Jopling, Scottish director of the Breakthrough Breast Cancer charity, said: ‘Patients in Scotland, and across the UK, should rightly expect that where they live will have no bearing on whether they can access the right breast cancer treatment for them.’
The figures show NHS Lanarkshire refused 30 out of 122 requests between 2011-12 and this April, while NHS Grampian rejected 15 out of 52.
Jean MacDonald, who has been repeatedly refused Avastin on the NHS, has spent her savings, as have her brother and mother, to afford the drug. She has so far paid £38,000 for her treatment, which ends in May.
Miss MacDonald, from Carmyle, Glasgow, said last night: ‘I don’t want anyone else to have to go through what I have. Where you live should not make a difference between life and death.’
NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde said other patients in the area had received Avastin, which is considered on a ‘case by case’ basis.
A Scottish Government spokesman said the ‘historic data’ did not reflect the current picture of access to new medicines across Scotland which had been changed.
She said: ‘The reforms made to the… system in 2013-14 show that hundreds more patients are accessing new treatments, with 92 per cent of requests approved in the first half of 2014-15 compared to 66 per cent in 2011-12.’