Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what his policy is on ensuring that patients have the right set out in the NHS Constitution to access any NICE-approved treatments that are clinically appropriate for them.

National Health Service patients’ right in the NHS Constitution to drugs and treatments recommended in National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) technology appraisal and highly specialised technology guidance, where clinically appropriate, is underpinned by the legal requirement for NHS commissioners to fund such treatments, normally within three months of NICE issuing its final guidance.