New Kadcyla deal for patients means NICE U-turn on guidance

A new deal on the breast cancer drug trastuzumab emtansine means that it can now be recommended for routine funding, the National Institute of Health and Care Excellence (NICE) announced today.

NHS England and the drug’s manufacturer, Swiss giant Roche (ROG: SIX), have agreed to a new commercial access arrangement for the National Health Service. This means that the NICE can now recommended the drug as cost effective for routine use on the NHS. The drug had previously been rejected by the medicines cost-effectiveness watchdog as too expensive

Kadcyla (trastuzumab emtansine) is currently being funded through the Cancer Drugs Fund (CDF). If there are no appeals against the new draft guidance, the drug will move out of the CDF into routine NHS funding later this summer.

Trastuzumab emtansine, which costs around £90,000 ($114.300) per patient at its full list price, is licensed to treat HER2-positive breast cancer which has spread to other parts of the body, cannot be surgically removed and has stopped responding to initial treatment. The NICE appraisal committee considered a new cost-effectiveness analysis that used a revised confidential commercial access agreement.

Another key factor in the decision was the committee’s agreement, following comments received during consultation on the previous draft guidance, that it was appropriate to compare trastuzumab emtansine with trastuzumab plus capecitabine because this is now considered standard treatment for people with advanced breast cancer.

Based on the clinical and cost effectiveness analysis, using this comparator, incorporating the revized commercial access agreement and applying end-of-life criteria, the drug now comes within the range considered to be a cost-effective use of NHS resources.

Richard Erwin, general manager of Roche in the UK, said: “Roche’s commitment to bringing Kadcyla to all eligible patients across the UK has never waned. We are delighted that it is now sustainably funded in England as well as in Scotland, and that it’s finally available on the NHS for the first time in Wales and Northern Ireland.”