NICE’s decision not to recommend olaparib for prostate cancer patients “disappointing”

Olaparib, a drug used to treat advanced prostate cancer patients, will not be made available on the NHS, after The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) said the treatment was not cost-effective.

NICE decided not to recommend the drug after an analysis found that the cost of olaparib (Lynparza) is higher than what NICE normally considers an acceptable use of NHS resources.

Rose Gray, Head of Policy Development at Cancer Research UK, said the decisions will be “disappointing for people affected by [certain types of] advanced prostate cancer”, given that evidence has shown olaparib can give people more time before their disease gets significantly worse and can help maintain some patients’ quality of life better than chemotherapy.

What is olaparib?

Olaparib is a type of targeted drug called a PARP inhibitor that is used to treat several types of cancer.

PARP is a protein that helps damaged cells to repair themselves. Some cancer cells rely on PARP to keep their DNA healthy. This includes cancer cells with a change in the BRCA genes. Olaparib stops PARP from repairing DNA damage, which kills the cancer cells.

The drug is used to treat people with prostate cancer with a mutation in the BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene that has spread to another part of the body. Cancer Research UK estimates that roughly one in 400 people in the UK have one of these gene mutations.

Olaparib’s efficacy has been demonstrated in large clinical trials, with one trial suggesting that the drug can help to slow down cancer growth.

It showed that patients taking olaparib lived without their cancer getting any bigger for an average of 7.4 months, in comparison to 3.6 months for those taking existing treatments.

Whether the drug can help to increase survival is yet to be determined.

NICE may re-consider the drug for approval

There is a possibility that NICE may re-consider the drug for approval through its rapid review process, whereby olaparib could be reviewed again under a revised price.

For the time being, it is likely the decision will affect patients in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. In Scotland, olaparib was approved for us in October 2021.

Lauren Nicolle

Lauren is a qualified journalist who writes primarily across the health and social care sectors. She is passionate about exposing the injustices faced by people with a learning disability, with a particular focus on equal access to healthcare.

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