RNIB funds court action against PCT

The pensioner suffers from wet AMD (age-related macular degeneration), which affects 26,000 people each year. If left untreated, the condition can lead to blindness in as little as three months. The RNIB says that the Trust has not funded a single course of anti-VEGF drugs, to treat the condition, despite more than 70 patients in their care needing treatment. The charity is backing the instruction of the law firm, Irwin Mitchell, which successfully fought for cancer sufferers to get the drug Herceptin.

Steve Winyard, RNIB’s Head of Campaigns, said: “Oxfordshire PCT has told Dennis that for him to be eligible for sight-saving treatment he must be an ‘exceptional case’. Dennis has had his appeal turned down three times now. If Dennis isn’t an ‘exceptional case’, then my question to Oxfordshire PCT is, who is?”

NICE recently announced preliminary guidelines, which could deny all but one in five patients in England and Wales treatment, and only after the patient has gone blind in one eye.