Blood Cancers

Debate between George Freeman and Jim Shannon

Thursday 7th July 2016 Westminster Hall

[George Freeman]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend. As she has made clear, and as I repeated earlier, it is tricky because the symptoms are not always straightforward or simple. It is often not a lump or something that is easily detectable, and the symptoms can easily be confused with those of other conditions that many of us might all too easily brush off and dismiss as the result of tiredness, fatigue and the general pressures of modern life. It is important that people recognise the symptoms. The all-party group and this debate will help to underline the importance of being aware of the early symptoms.

So far there have been 11 national Be Clear on Cancer campaigns covering seven types of cancer, and a national respiratory symptoms campaign will run from July to October this year to raise awareness of lung disease. I shall obviously ensure that the Under-Secretary of State for Health, my hon. Friend the Member for Battersea (Jane Ellison) is aware of this debate and will make clear to her the cross-party support for greater awareness of blood cancers.

[Jim Shannon]

I am not sure whether this is the Minister’s responsibility, but those of us who have participated in the debate are very aware of the issues relating to the accelerated access review. We are keen to know whether there could be a review of the scheme and of access to drugs. Even if the review were to resolve the many issues surrounding the speed with which new medicines are evaluated by NICE, unless there is meaningful change to the final decision-making process, new medicines will fail to reach patients. I suspect that is the Minister’s responsibility, but he can confirm that. How can we improve the accelerated access review? I know the Minister will have a good answer and I want to give him an opportunity to share it.

[George Freeman]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for reading my mind—not for the first time—because the next paragraph in my speech is about the cancer drugs fund and the accelerated access review. His intervention gives me a moment to highlight some of the important points that colleagues have made. The hon. Gentleman, who is something of a biomedical stalker of mine on these occasions, as he acknowledged—we rarely appear in this House other than together—was right to highlight the great work that Queen’s University Belfast does on blood cancers. He spoke with great passion about his father’s experience.

My hon. Friend the Member for Erewash (Maggie Throup) spoke about her experience as a haematologist in this field and about being involved on the frontline of research. That is another example of the power of having Members with a range of career backgrounds in the House. She brings great expertise to these matters.

The hon. Member for Coventry North East (Colleen Fletcher), who is vice-chair of the all-party group, made some important points about the CDF, to which I will return, and described the experience of her husband Ian. She asked whether I would meet the Anthony Nolan Trust; I will. I have already had several meetings with the trust and will continue to meet it, and when I do, I will pick up on the issues she mentioned relating to post-transplantation care in particular.

My hon. Friend the Member for Crawley spoke powerfully about his mother’s experience and made some really important points, not least about data and the importance of our harnessing it and generating a new model of appraisal. I will pick up on the latter point when I discuss the accelerated access review.

The hon. Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Martyn Day) discussed NICE and how important it is that we tackle the new landscape and make sure we are quicker and better at assessing new medicines. The hon. Member for Hackney North and Stoke Newington raised several important issues in a spirit of cross-party non-partisanship that I hugely welcome and appreciate.

I return to the cancer drugs fund. At the beginning of the previous Parliament, the Government, led by the Prime Minister, made the important commitment that we would put in place a cancer drugs fund to ensure that UK patients got access to the very latest cancer drug treatments. We did that in response to a number of high-profile cases in which NICE, applying its standard, one-size-fits-all quality-adjusted life year, had turned down cancer drugs, and patients were desperate for some hope, wanting the system to be responsive to their needs.

I am proud that we have made a total commitment of more than £1 billion to the cancer drugs fund and that we are continuing to invest each year, with more than £300 million put in this year. However, the system as it was originally set up has not proved to be sustainable, because of the pressure—inevitable pressure, in some ways, given the extraordinary explosion of our medical advances—put on it. If drug companies are turned down by NICE and there is a fund available for a post-NICE approval, the companies simply go to it and it has become over-subscribed.

NHS England has moved in the right direction by taking our funding commitment and repositioning the CDF as an early access and managed-access fund that examines more innovative drugs, ensures that they are provided to patients more quickly and makes sure that the data from that early access is allowed to inform the selection of the drugs that are adopted.

The truth is that breakthroughs in 21st century drug discovery and the rise of better targeted medicines are bringing huge benefits for patients but they also place huge pressure on our traditional models of assessment, adoption and reimbursement. With a rapidly ageing society and an explosion of new treatments, we cannot continue with the old model of one size fits all, with the NHS acting as a late procurer at a retail price of every drug. At the heart of my portfolio is a mission to unleash the power of the NHS as a research partner in bringing new drugs to market and getting a dividend—a discount—in return for that work.

We spend around £14 billion on medicines in the NHS every year and over £5.5 billion of that is spent on cancer drugs. The new generation of cancer therapies are incredibly exciting. The immunotherapies that we are seeing do not just delay death or grant patients a few extra months or years; they are cures for cancer. Those Daily Mail headlines that have been promising cures for cancers for more than 20 years are finally true. We now have cancer cures coming through, which profoundly changes the way that we will have to price drugs.

Let me say something about the accelerated access review, NICE and the CDF. At the heart of the accelerated access review is a commitment from the Government to consider whether and how we can better harness our extraordinary NHS assets as an integrated healthcare system to become a partner in the development of new therapies, so that instead of the industry treating the NHS as an increasingly pressurised retail-based consumer that struggles with this explosion of ever more expensive technology, we become a partner. Then, in return for sharing our clinical assets, for working with charities and the industry around our £1 billion-a-year National Institute for Health Research network, and for our leadership in genomics and informatics, we can pull innovation through more quickly for patients, share a data package and be the first place on Earth that companies want to come to in order to have their innovations assessed.

The accelerated access review has been examining a whole range of complex issues in this field and its report is waiting for a post-referendum slot to be published. I can assure Members that in the time that the review team has been preparing that report for publication, I have not been sitting around waiting for it; along with NHS England, I have been doing the preparatory work to be ready for it. Without in any way wanting to pre-empt the report, let me just share with colleagues some thoughts about where I think there is a huge degree of consensus between the Department of Health and NHS England on how we might be able to make some moves.

There are three key areas. First, in specialist commissioning, which deals with many rare diseases and rare cancers, the drugs are commissioned nationally through the Department of Health and NHS England. We want to see whether we can pull together that commissioning function into a more innovative procurement unit, to pull through and do some more innovative deals with industry in return for discounts—acceleration for discounts.

Secondly, we want to consider the NICE pathways through to NHS England and ask whether we can make it easier for innovators either to go through a series of much clearer NICE pathways or to go straight to NHS England and do pricing, discounting, acceleration and volume deals, as well making sure that we have an transparency and accountability framework so that people can see which parties in the ecosystem are fulfilling their mandate.

[Mr Clive Betts in the Chair]

The evidence from recent NICE approvals is encouraging. Many thousands of people have benefited from blood cancer drugs that NICE has recommended, such as bortezomib, ofatumumab and rituximab, and the evidence is that if we gather the data properly from the drugs that we approve, then we can use that as an intelligent health service to inform which drugs we adopt and pull through more quickly. If we get that right, the CDF in its reformatted position as a managed-access fund operating earlier in the system could become a powerful vehicle for an accelerated-access model of cancer drugs assessment. That will require some careful work on the NICE/NHS England framework, but we are doing that work right now, as we speak.

I will close, Mr Walker, by saying that—ah, Mr Walker has been replaced by you, Mr Betts.

Antibiotics: Research and Development

Debate between George Freeman and Jim Shannon

Tuesday 26th April 2016 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Life Sciences (George Freeman)]

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Evans. I believe we are expecting a vote, so my speech may be interrupted. I shall crack on, awaiting the bell.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for York Outer (Julian Sturdy) on securing the debate and on the tenacity with which he has raised this issue in the House in recent years. It is a great opportunity to have this debate today, when so much is going on this week in London on international health leadership. My hon. Friend’s speech and the informed and constructive comments that he and others have made highlight how seriously this issue is taken throughout the House. Last Monday we had more than 60 Members of Parliament in this Chamber. The fact that we have a dozen today does not suggest that there is any less interest; many Members are tied up in other debates. I know that Members from all parties are concerned about this issue.

The debate is timely, because it coincides with a two-day international summit on antimicrobial resistance convened by the Wellcome Trust in London, which brings together a global gathering of scientists and policy makers to explore key areas for action. I thank the Wellcome Trust and pay tribute to it for its leadership. In so many areas of public policy, it has put its money and expertise to work for us. I also pay tribute to Jim O’Neill and his team, as others have done, for their work on the issue.

I will set out the context of the debate, as a number of other hon. Members have done. Antibiotics play a crucial role not just in human health but in animal health and welfare—my hon. Friend is a doughty campaigner for agricultural causes—and so are of great strategic interest in the wider field of biosecurity. We have seen the impact of diseases in domestic and agricultural poultry and in some of our tree species, and we are trying to view this issue in the wider global context of biosecurity from infectious diseases.

[Jim Shannon]

There have been some marvellous steps forward in addressing the use of antibiotics on poultry, as I indicated in my speech. Many people are trying to move that forward. If we take steps forward with poultry and other animals, we can transfer that work to humans too.

[George Freeman]

The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point. As ever, Belfast University and the Northern Ireland life sciences cluster are doing good work in agriculture and in the medical space.

For the reasons that I outlined, the growth of resistance presents a genuine strategic global threat, which, as hon. Members from throughout the House have gratifyingly acknowledged, the Government have taken a strategic grip of. Globally, some 700,000 people will die this year because of antimicrobial resistance. In Europe, the healthcare and societal costs of resistance are estimated to be of the order of €1.5 billion per annum. That translates into a verifiable and measurable cost to the NHS of £180 million, but it may well be an awful lot more. Meanwhile, we face an antibiotic discovery void. The golden age of discovery ended in the 1980s. We have had very few new antibiotics since then and no new class since 1987.

I had a 15-year career in the sector and spent one chunk of it starting, financing and managing a small anti-infectives company that was spun out of Hammersmith and Imperial College and used some phenomenally powerful technology to look at the genetics of how microbes reproduce. We spent a lot of money on some elegant science, but we did not produce a new anti-infective. The truth is that these bugs are very difficult targets in biomedicine. It is difficult to go after the cell wall of Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria. Their ability to reproduce and develop resistance to drugs—they are moving targets, as it were—makes it particularly difficult to design effective drugs for them.

The good news—if I may put it that way—is that we can do things that will make and are making a real difference. The chief medical officer outlined the scale of the issue and its implications for public health in her 2013 annual report. She called for urgent action at a national and international level. The UK responded by publishing our five-year antimicrobial resistance strategy, the core aims of which were to improve understanding of resistance, to ensure that existing medicines remain effective and to stimulate the development of new antibiotics, diagnostics and therapies. Three years on, we have made considerable progress. We have put the building blocks for success in place, including better data, guidance and a strengthened framework—

Brain Tumours

Debate between George Freeman and Jim Shannon

Monday 18th April 2016 Westminster Hall

[George Freeman]

The hon. Lady, with whom I work closely on a number of issues, makes an excellent point. There are a number of criteria that drive how funding is allocated, and that is one of the things we ought to look at. If I can get to the end of my speech, I will make some recommendations about how we might pick that up and look at it.

I want to announce today that the Government accept that we need to do more in this space, committing to a number of specific actions that reflect the concerns that have been raised, both here and in the Petitions Committee and the all-party group report. I suggest that I should convene in the Department of Health a task and finish group to examine a number of the issues that have been raised here today, and to ask a question. I do not believe that as a Government we are not doing enough. We have put £0.7 billion a year into the Medical Research Council, to do the deep science on the medical frontier. We have put £1 billion a year—ring-fenced—into the National Institute for Health Research’s clinical infrastructure. We are funding the genomics programme and putting £4 billion into digital health and the informatics that go around it. The question we should ask is: surely there is more we can do to help to make that resource and that infrastructure support this particular disease area? I will say a little more about why I think that case has been made and what we might do about it.

I will not repeat all the numbers—hon. Members have heard them—but about 4,000 brain cancer cases are diagnosed each year in this country, resulting in about 3,500 deaths a year. We all know that brain tumours are very complicated—there are about 130 different types of them—and the truth is that we do not know what causes most of these cancers. Old age is a risk factor, but as many hon. Members have said with great passion today, it is those children who are diagnosed who drive us. Four-hundred children a year are diagnosed, and we just do not understand or know exactly what is driving it. There are various hypotheses around genetic conditions and some exposures.

Unlike for most other cancers, brain cancer mortality rates have increased. According to figures from the Office for National Statistics, in the last 30 years the mortality rate for brain cancer has increased by 15% for men and almost 10% for women. Improvements in diagnostics and treatments have helped to improve short-term survival in adults, with around 49% of people diagnosed with brain cancer now surviving for at least a year, compared with around 25% 30 years ago. Long-term survival has also improved, with around 20% of people now surviving for five years or more, compared with around 10% 30 years ago. We have also recently seen an increase of more than 25% in GP referrals for magnetic resonance imaging for potential brain tumours, from about 30,000 to 50,000. Veterans of these issues will know that those are relatively small numbers over quite a long period, compared with the explosive pace of progress in a number of the other disease areas that we often discuss.

A number of Members have talked about early diagnosis, which is clearly absolutely key with this cancer, as with all cancers. Last year, a report by the independent cancer taskforce set out 96 recommendations, broadly covering six strategic priorities, including early diagnosis, and NHS England is working with partners to establish a new cancer programme to implement those recommendations. By the end of this Parliament, everyone referred with a suspected cancer will receive a definitive diagnosis or the all-clear within four weeks.

[Jim Shannon]

rose—

[George Freeman]

I will give way to the hon. Gentleman, because he is a doughty pursuer of mine.

[Jim Shannon]

I thank the Minister for his response. Will he set out the funding or help that he can give to universities? He knows I am very keen on that issue. Universities have put forward some very good medical initiatives and some new medications and medicines as well, and Queen’s University Belfast is one of those universities. Can we do more with universities, business and Government? If we can, we can find the cure, which would be a big step forward.

[George Freeman]

I think we can do more and I welcome this opportunity to praise the role of Queen’s University Belfast in this field; it is a centre of real excellence in cancer science.

The standard treatment by the end of this Parliament will be underpinned by a commitment of an extra £300 million from Government in diagnostics. Last June, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence published updated guidance on cancer referrals, which will make it easier for GPs to think about the possibility of cancer much sooner and to refer people for tests more quickly. This guidance includes new recommendations about brain cancer in adults, children and young people.

We are investing substantially in research. That is not to say we are doing enough—I will come to that in a moment—but we are investing £1.7 billion every year in health research. I am delighted that in the last autumn statement my right hon. Friend the Chancellor ring-fenced our investment, despite some difficult public spending pressures. We spend £0.7 billion a year on the MRC and £1 billion a year on the NIHR’s clinical infrastructure across the NHS. Cancer research spend by the NIHR rose by over a third during the last Parliament to around £135 million a year. Most of that investment—around £115 million—is on infrastructure. The model is that industry and charity can then run research projects through that infrastructure—I will come back to that point in a moment. That investment supports translating scientific breakthroughs into benefits for patients.

Spend specifically on brain tumour research cannot currently be separated out from total spend data for the cancer research infrastructure. I can, reassuringly, share with colleagues the information that six of our 11 NIHR biomedical research centres are conducting brain tumour research, and that the NIHR clinical research network had 30 brain tumour research studies that were recruiting patients in 2015-16. The NIHR is also funding research programmes and fellowships. For example, the health technology assessment programme is funding a £1.4 million trial involving patients who have received surgery for atypical meningioma.

The other main Government fund for health is the MRC. Over the five years to 2014-15, the MRC spent £10.9 million on research into brain and pituitary tumours, which spans basic discovery science, translational projects and early clinical trials. Both the NIHR and MRC also fund the Clinical Practice Research Datalink—the CPRD —which shares data for research. Four brain tumour studies have been published using CPRD data.

I want to mention the important role of charities. Those that follow my work will know that I have recently opened the door and made what has been described as a bold, generous and comprehensive offer to the Association of Medical Research Charities to come to the top table in the new landscape of life science research co-ordination that I am putting place. Medical research charities in this country raise £1.4 billion every year for research, from the smallest charities on the high street to CRUK, which has now become a major strategic funder and shaper of cancer policy.

I welcome the work that the 18 major charitable and public funders of cancer research are doing in the UK through the National Cancer Research Institute. Through that work and the work that the NIHR is doing with research councils, increased brain tumour research investment by charities drives increased support by the NIHR. Here is the challenge: our system works on the basis of bids and of accelerated funding. Once funding starts to drive clinical and academic results, that generates more funding, which drives more research. The danger in that model is that, unless that initial critical mass can be achieved, things can get squeezed out.

We have invited a number of applications for experimental cancer medicine centre status over this funding period, which are funded by the NIHR and Cancer Research UK. I am delighted to be able to announce that, on behalf of the arm’s-length bodies, NHS England will next month publish an implementation plan for the cancer taskforce strategy, “Achieving world-class cancer outcomes”. As part of one of the specific recommendations in that strategy, Public Health England is investigating how we can use new and existing data sources to identify secondary cancers and cancer progression more generally, including for brain tumours.

I hope I have demonstrated that some progress is being made, but as I have said, I do not think that progress being made is a reason not to do more; I think hon. Members have made a powerful case that we should. We formally accept that more needs to be done. The case has been made that we need to look carefully at what we can do. As the report recommends, I will be asking the NIHR to look at publishing a national register that considers how we spend public funds across research of different disease areas and different organs by therapeutic area, not least because it is a powerful way of helping to draw in co-investment from industry and charities. I shall be raising those issues with the MRC and, having recently convened the NIHR Parliament day, suggesting that at next year’s NIHR Parliament day we come back with that register and that breakdown of information.

We should look at issues around earlier diagnosis. I am prepared to announce today that we should specifically include brain cancer in the Genomics England programme, which is dealing with rare diseases and cancers, to make sure that it is properly picked up, and to talk to NICE about the point made about its guidance procedures. To pull all this together, I want to suggest that I should convene a task and finish working group in the Department of Health to touch on other issues that have been raised, including data collection, trials, off-label drugs, research barriers and skills.

I am conscious that I need to leave the sponsor of the debate a few seconds to close, but I hope that colleagues will see in my response that I have tried both to give patients some hope that we are listening and to strike a blow for good democracy, as well as good medical research.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between George Freeman and Jim Shannon

Tuesday 15th December 2015 Commons Chamber

[George Freeman]

My hon. Friend makes an important point, and around the country—not just in Cambridge, Oxford, and London MedCity, but in the Northern Health Science Alliance and the Scottish belt—the UK life science industry is building clusters of excellence and growth for the benefit of our citizens. I am holding discussions with the Chancellor and the Department for Communities and Local Government about how the devolution package could drive and support greater development of those health clusters around the country.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

The Minister referred earlier to moneys that have been set aside by the Government for research and development in the aerospace industry. In my constituency, 6,500 people are directly employed by Magellan and Bombardier, and double that number are subcontracted. What discussions has the Minister had with the Northern Ireland Assembly to ensure that we can be part of that research and development?

Cancer Drugs

Debate between George Freeman and Jim Shannon

Tuesday 20th October 2015 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Life Sciences (George Freeman)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone, at this early hour of the morning. I know that many Members would have liked to have been here for this debate. I suspect that if the debate had been scheduled for the main Chamber, we would probably have half-filled it, given the level of interest. I am delighted to have the chance to respond.

First, I congratulate and pay tribute to my friend, the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon). He is, as a number of colleagues have observed, a tenacious campaigner on this subject, and I am glad that we have kept up our record of 100% support for each other. He is a parliamentary champion of this cause, and it is a pleasure to work with him on it. He spoke powerfully about his own family’s experience of cancer, as did the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne). I am sure many Members from all parts of the House have experience of cancer. My father died of throat cancer when I was 19. It is a disease that still, despite all the progress, robs families and stalks the land. I will say something in a minute about the progress that has been made, because it is stunning.

I suspect when many of us were children, that word—cancer—normally spelled a quick and tragic death. Now, more than 2 million people living in Britain have had a cancer diagnosis. Cancer Research UK and all those involved in cancer research have achieved extraordinary things, but it is still a diagnosis and treatment that people dread. Cancer is a serious cause of early death, and it was powerful to have heard such cross-party support for cancer research.

As the hon. Member for Strangford and others observed, cancer does not respect any boundaries, whether they are of geography, income or party politics, although I make the point that it heavily correlates with health inequalities. Many colleagues in the House with constituencies with particularly high incidences of cancers also have constituencies with particularly a high incidence of poverty generally. There is a strong link between life chances and poverty and health and health inequalities. I observe that the Petitions Committee has received a petition on Abraxane, which is a symptom of how widely the concern on this issue goes across the House.

I will try to deal with some of the issues that have been raised. The truth is that the field of cancer research has pioneered the model of 21st-century drug discovery and life science research that is transforming how the sector works. That is driven principally by breakthroughs in genomics, genetic science and informatics—the ability to develop treatments and diagnostics based on being able to predict which patients will respond to which drugs and which patients are likely to be predisposed to a particular disease. Such breakthroughs and the use of big data, big informatics and genomic insights into the use of genomic biomarkers are allowing us to redesign the way in which drugs are discovered and developed. Cancer has led in that field partly because cancer is itself a genetic disease and because of the extraordinary work of Cancer Research UK and various other charities. I pay tribute to their work and leadership not only in deep science, but in the policy-making framework on treatment, diagnosis and care. I will talk about the cancer strategy that CRUK has helped us to put together in a moment.

The role of charities is growing in this space. I recently opened a combined laboratory in Cambridge shared by Cancer Research UK and MedImmune, a subsidiary of AstraZeneca. We have seen partnerships and collaborations between charities and companies before, but this was a joint laboratory, jointly funded with a joint research committee. It is a sign of where this landscape is going. We will see charities become the gatekeepers of patient power, patient tissues and patient genomic information, and gatekeepers of the patient asset in this new landscape of patient-centred research. It is a very exciting time for medical research charities.

Pioneering cancer research has made many cancers diagnosable and treatable diseases. As I have said, more than 2 million people now live with cancer. Diagnosis is still poor in pancreatic and colon cancer, and in many cases there is no proper cure, but about 98% of breast cancers are treatable and curable. That is a stunning breakthrough and I am sure that over the next 20 or 30 years we will see all cancers quickly reach that point. We need to recognise the extraordinary improvements in this field. The role of genetics and informatics is welcomed by the Government. We are doing everything we can through our life sciences strategy, set out by the Prime Minister in 2011, to drive this new landscape.

We have made groundbreaking commitments with the Genomics England programme. We are the first nation to commit to sequence the genomes from 100,000 NHS patients and combine that with clinical data. We have made groundbreaking commitments to open up our data sets to drive this model of 21st-century research. It is important that all of us who understand the power of that work also support it, because our constituents worry about the use of data. We need to make sure we safeguard individual patient data, and we need to make sure we unlock the assets of the NHS throughout the United Kingdom so that we are a genuine powerhouse in the 21st-century model of patient-centred research.

I want to pay tribute to the work of Northern Ireland scientists, academics and companies. The hon. Member for Strangford mentioned the Experimental Cancer Medicine Centre at Queen’s University. He is absolutely right that it is a world-class centre. I visited earlier in the year to commend, congratulate and support the team there. Sometimes the sector appears to be more interested in Oxford, Cambridge and London than in the extraordinary world-class centres out on the corners of the United Kingdom. I went specifically for that reason. The work there is not only world class in terms of the deep science on the cell mechanisms of cancer, but, in embracing the unified life sciences strategy research and treatment, the centre has helped to pioneer leadership in stratified medicine, pulling in inward investment and, interestingly, taking the patient catchment for the lower quartile of cancer outcomes to the upper quartile. That is a sign of how research medicine drives up clinical standards.

[Jim Shannon]

I visited Queen’s University in Belfast in the summer. They told me that they wished to see more partnerships and relationships with other universities, including on the mainland. The funding strand needs to be encouraged and we need to be a part of that. Will the Minister take that on board? I am sure he knows all about it, but I simply remind him.

[George Freeman]

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. I will be discussing the matter with the Minister for Universities and Science and the Medical Research Council. We need to make sure that we move to a more networked and collaborative model of science funding. Traditionally, we have tended to fund established centres of excellence, which is important, but we also need to make sure we build networks. Cancer networks in research and treatment have been incredibly powerful in driving the advances that we have discussed. He makes a very good point. I was delighted to see the leadership of the Queen’s centre recently recognised by Cancer Research UK with a £3.6 million grant.

I want to talk about the wider landscape of cancer treatment and then turn to the drugs question.

Fibromyalgia

Debate between George Freeman and Jim Shannon

Wednesday 1st July 2015 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Life Sciences (George Freeman)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Reading West (Alok Sharma) on securing a debate on this important issue. In his constituency, he has shown great support for his local fibromyalgia patient group by advocating on its behalf, raising money and raising the profile of the disease, which is so debilitating for its sufferers. He has helped the group to continue its important work of improving awareness of the condition and providing advice to patients and their families. I pay tribute to the work of FMA UK, other fibromyalgia charities and the many patient support groups around the country who work tirelessly to raise the profile of the disease and support those who are affected by it. I welcome today’s merger of FMA UK and FibroAction, which will help to give a stronger patient voice to those who are affected.

Fibromyalgia is an incurable musculoskeletal condition of unknown cause that can have a debilitating impact on those who are affected. Although no exact figures are available, research suggests that fibromyalgia affects around 2.5 million patients in the UK, the majority of whom are women over the age of 40. Fibromyalgia symptoms affect the soft tissues, muscles, tendons and ligaments of the body and result in widespread and variable pain throughout the body. Poor-quality, non-refreshing sleep contributes to an ongoing cycle of chronic pain and fatigue, and, in some cases, poor concentration and short-term memory problems. Irritable bowel syndrome, restless legs, head and neck pain and sensitivity to temperature change are also associated symptoms of fibromyalgia. The symptoms and their severity differ from patient to patient.

Diagnosing the symptoms of fibromyalgia can be challenging for GPs. Some 20% of the general population consult their GP about a musculoskeletal problem each year, which amounts to more than 100,000 consultations a day. The symptoms of fibromyalgia are common to other conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis, lupus and chronic fatigue syndrome. In addition, patients with fibromyalgia can often visibly appear well, despite their symptoms. GPs face a further obstacle because there is no diagnostic test that accurately identifies the condition. A diagnosis is usually made via a process of diagnostic investigation to exclude other potential causes of the patient’s ill health. It is, therefore, important that clinicians have the training, tools and resources to help them identify fibromyalgia symptoms when a patient presents.

Musculoskeletal conditions are a key part of the generalist undergraduate MBBS medical curriculum. The General Medical Council requires that the MBBS curriculum provide enough structured clinical placements to enable students to demonstrate the outcomes for graduates across a range of clinical specialties, including musculoskeletal health. Musculoskeletal health is also a key component of GP training, and the Royal College of General Practitioners’ curriculum statement on musculoskeletal conditions sets it out that GPs should be able to diagnose and manage common regional pain syndromes such as fibromyalgia.

In addition to clinical training and experience, GPs have at their disposal a number of tools and resources. They include: the Map of Medicine, an online evidence-based guide and clinical decision support tool available to GPs and other healthcare professionals in the NHS, which has a fibromyalgia and chronic pain pathway, and helps clinicians to identify the symptoms and make the right referral; a free e-learning course on musculoskeletal care, including fibromyalgia, developed by the RCGP and Arthritis Research UK, which aims to improve skills in diagnosing and managing musculoskeletal conditions; NHS evidence services, which provide access to a vast online repository of clinical knowledge and guidance covering a wide range of conditions, including fibromyalgia; and a fibromyalgia medical guide for health professionals developed by FMA UK.

Once a patient is diagnosed with fibromyalgia, a number of treatment options are available to them. In the absence of a cure, relieving pain and restoring quality of life are the primary clinical goals. Treatment options include pain relieving medication, physiotherapy, dietary and exercise advice, counselling or cognitive behavioural therapy, and self-management programmes to give patients the skills and confidence to manage their condition. The routine assessment and management of pain is a required competency of all health professionals. Many patients can have their fibromyalgia successfully managed through routine access to locally commissioned services via GPs, and community and secondary care services. I will turn to my hon. Friend’s point about specialist clinics in a moment.

[Jim Shannon]

The hon. Member for Reading West (Alok Sharma) and I asked how we can raise awareness within the GP profession to ensure that GPs understand the symptoms of fibromyalgia and diagnose it earlier. As I pointed out in my intervention, only 3% of people in Northern Ireland have been diagnosed with the condition, but the number of people who suffer from it is far larger. There seems to be a gap between those who have been diagnosed and those who have not. Is that because GPs are not really aware of the condition? How can we make them more aware?

[George Freeman]

The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point, and he is helping to raise awareness today. I will pass on the points made today to the team at NHS England with responsibility for this issue. The answer to the question on awareness is to support debates such as this, and to promote the work of the charity and the patient advocacy groups.

The routine assessment of pain is a required competency for all healthcare professionals. However, patients who remain in high levels of pain after conventional approaches to treatment have failed are able to access specialised pain services, which are nationally commissioned by NHS England. Patients referred to such services receive multidisciplinary team care from clinicians with expertise in pain management.