A clinical commissioning group (CCG) has set out to save cash by treating AMD patients with bevacizumab, which it said is cheaper and as effective.
Dr David Hambleton, chief officer of the South Tyneside CCG, has told the British Medical Journal that commissioners in the area have agreed to use a cheaper AMD treatment, despite potential legal disputes with the manufacturers involved.
He said 12 clinical commissioning groups in the region had agreed to offer the thousands of wet AMD patients the choice of bevacizumab (Avastin) as a preferred treatment. The drug is used to treat cancer but not licensed for macular degeneration in this country.
Dr Hambleton said bevacizumab was as clinically effective and safe as the more expensive but commonly used ranibizumab (Lucentis). He said this ‘has been shown comprehensively’.
He also estimated the policy could save the region’s NHS up to £13.5m a year over the next five years, which would fund 270 nurses or 266 heart transplants every year.
Dr Hambleton added: ‘We want to have informed conversations with our patients so that they understand the wider effects of the choices we collectively make. If a patient chooses to be treated with aflibercept [Eylea] or ranibizumab then that is the drug that the NHS will provide.
‘As CCGs, we have no interest in protracted legal disputes, but drug companies should not dictate which treatments are available to NHS patients. The choice between three clinically effective drugs should be one for NHS clinicians and patients to make together.’
The BMJ reported that drug companies Bayer, which markets Eylea, and Novartis, which markets Lucentis, has threatened to take legal action over the plans.
