Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what plans his Department has to task NICE with publication of guidelines for heart valve disease.

From April 2013, NHS England is the lead commissioner for clinical guidelines for topics which have a principal focus on healthcare.

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) published a clinical guideline on chronic heart failure in 2010 that includes recommendations on the management of chronic heart failure caused by valve disease. Further information is available on NICE’s website at:

www.nice.org.uk/guidance/cg108

NICE has reviewed the need to update this clinical guideline and concluded in January 2015 that an update will be scheduled into its work programme. Details of the update will be available on NICE’s guidelines in development webpage in due course.