NHS England, please keep Abraxane on the list

Tomorrow, NHS England will be reviewing life-extending drug Abraxane.  If they decide to remove it from their list of approved drugs, it means eligible pancreatic cancer patients in England will not have access to a treatment that could provide them with valuable extra time.

Pancreatic cancer has suffered from chronic underfunding for pancreatic cancer research, which has meant that there has been no newly licensed drug which has shown a significant survival advantage for use in pancreatic cancer for almost two decades.

Abraxane, in combination with gemcitabine has, in clinical trials shown to increase survival by two months on average, but some patients in the trial have benefitted from up to two years’ survival. This is very encouraging for advanced pancreatic cancer patients.

It is absolutely vital that the CDF keep this drug on the list.