No funding for NICE treatment

doi:10.1136/bmj.b4177

Published 12 October 2009, doi:10.1136/bmj.b4177
Cite this as: BMJ 2009;339:b4177

Letters

Surgery for obesity

No funding for NICE treatment

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Leff and Heath say that funding for bariatric surgery must beapplied for on an individual patient basis from the primarycare trust, which must apply the guidelines of the NationalInstitute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE).¹ This seemsnot to be happening in practice.

I have been supporting a young patient with morbid obesity andassociated depression. With input from secondary care psychiatryand specialised dietitian services she is doing a little better,but her body mass index remains greater than 54 and is increasing.At a review meeting she and her partner were pleased to hearthat we were considering referral for gastric banding. Knowingthat she met the NICE criteria, we did not foresee any problemwith funding. However, when I inquired about the referral process,a spokesperson for Health Commission Wales replied that it setsa higher threshold for body mass index than NICE (50, . . . [Full text of this article]