Trusts can take cost into account when deciding drug treatment

doi:10.1136/bmj.332.7547.928-a

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Clare Dyer, legal correspondent

Last week's Appeal Court judgment to force the NHS to pay for trastuzumab (Herceptin) will not oblige primary care trusts to fund the drug for every woman whose oncologist prescribes it—although most of the media reported that it would.

Three Appeal Court judges headed by the master of the rolls, Anthony Clarke, unanimously ruled that Swindon NHS Primary Care Trust irrationally and unlawfully refused to pay for the treatment for Ann Marie Rogers, 54, who has early stage HER2 positive breast cancer.

The drug has been licensed and assessed …