The ABPI is calling for the NHS to give it more data on the uptake and access to new medicines.
This comes after the second publication of the ‘Innovation Scorecard’, which measures how well different parts of the NHS in England are using new drugs.
The Scorecard, released by the NHS Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC), includes a number of new medicines which were not included in the first January report.
While welcoming the new data, the ABPI said that in future versions it wanted a more “extensive Scorecard” to help illustrate a more comprehensive picture of the use of NICE appraised medicines.
This is so that any variation in treatments – a major bugbear for pharma in the UK – can be seen by the public and acted upon by industry and government.
The HSCIC said, however, that it is “not appropriate” to draw conclusions from comparison of the data for 2011 in the first scorecard with that for 2012 in this second publication, “as many factors may be responsible for any apparent variation”.
These include differences in populations served, services provided and changes in clinical practice.
The ABPI said it would like future Scorecards to include further data sets, so doctors and members of the public can gain a fuller understanding of how well innovation is being adopted to improve patient care.
Specifically, the UK pharma group would like to see future Scorecards:
• Include formulary publication and use of those NICE appraised medicines
• Include more new medicines launched within the last 0-5 years
• Include data analysed by Academic Health Science Network geographic areas
• Link the work of the NICE Implementation Collaborative to the Scorecard
• Develop new measures to highlight variations in medicines use across the NHS
• Become more user friendly so members of the public can more readily use it
Stephen Whitehead, chief executive of the ABPI, said: “I am pleased that the latest Innovation Scorecard has built on the first publication in January and we are now seeing more new medicines included in the report.
“But in future updates, including the next Scorecard set for publication in September; we want to see its depth and scope increase significantly. This is essential because if the Scorecard is to be a genuine driver of change, it must be comprehensive and detailed enough for people to make meaningful judgements about the state of innovation in the NHS.”
The reporting period for the Scorecard is the calendar year 2012 for medicines related technology appraisals and financial year 2012-13 – to the end of June 2012, there were 229 current appraisals from NICE. The full report can be found here: https://catalogue.ic.nhs.uk/publications/prescribing/secondary/nice-tech-apps-eng-2012-exp-inno-scor-rep/nice-tech-apps-eng-2012-exp-inno-scor-rep.pdf
