Arthritis Care: Decision is a "triumph"
Wednesday, 22 Aug 2007 12:47
Arthritis Care (AC) has welcomed the decision by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) to approve the new arthritis drug MabThera for use on the NHS.
The charity said that thousands of people now have the hope of having normal social and working lives.
Mabthera can be given to people with rheumatoid arthritis (RA), a condition which causes inflammation of the joints, when other treatments have failed.
RA leads to pain, swelling and stiffness and affects about 400,000 people in England and Wales.
"It's a triumph," commented Arthritis Care's chief executive Neil Betteridge on Nice's decision.
"The search for effective treatment can be a long, agonising journey, littered with dashed hopes. Now there's no excuse to deny this drug on anything but clinical grounds.
"Nice has shown that it understands the benefit of expanding the range of choices for individuals who have exhausted other options, and would otherwise face the bleak prospect of palliative care, and a return to drugs that have already failed them," Mr Betteridge added.
