National Institute for Health and Care Excellence
Approved cancer drugs and treatments such as radiotherapy and chemotherapy are funded by the NHS without any financial contribution being taken from the patient. Where NICE has approved a treatment, the NHS must fund it. But not all treatments have been assessed by NICE and these treatments are usually dependent on local NHS decision making. In the case of cancer the Cancer Drugs Fund was set up in 2011 after complaints about NICE decisions on new and expensive cancer drugs with limited benefits. Treatment for fertility problems are approved but not always funded by clinical commissioning groups and they may cap the number of rounds.
Cancer pain
Due to the poor quality of most studies of complementary and alternative medicine in the treatment of cancer pain, it is not possible to recommend integration of these therapies into the management of cancer pain. There is weak evidence for a modest benefit from hypnosis; studies of massage therapy produced mixed results and none found pain relief after 4 weeks; Reiki, and touch therapy results were inconclusive; acupuncture, the most studied such treatment, has demonstrated no benefit as an adjunct analgesic in cancer pain; the evidence for music therapy is equivocal; and some herbal interventions such as PC-SPES, mistletoe, and saw palmetto are known to be toxic to some people with cancer. The most promising evidence, though still weak, is for mind-body interventions such as biofeedback and relaxation techniques.