Abiraterone: Prostate Cancer
(asked on 19th January 2024) - View Source
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, which NHS bodies have a role in the consideration of Abiraterone for inclusion in the drug repurposing programme for the treatment of locally advanced high-risk non-metastatic prostate cancer; and what the remit of each body is in that process.
The national, multi-agency Medicines Repurposing Programme is hosted and funded by NHS England and is overseen by a steering group, including decision-making members from the Department, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, the National Institute for Health and Care Research, and NHS England. Each of the national agencies brings a different contribution to the programme, in line with their respective regulatory and statutory responsibilities.
The programme steering group has not discussed adopting abiraterone for high-risk, non-metastatic hormone sensitive prostate cancer into the repurposing programme. This is because an off-label clinical commissioning policy covering the off-label use of abiraterone in this indication is being developed by NHS England and, in this case, NHS England considers this to be the most appropriate route to support a decision on routine patient access in the National Health Service. The policy is being considered through the established process in line with the current methods, which are available at the following link: