§ Mr. Pavittasked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will publish in the Official Report the criteria on which the appeals committees will judge the right of a doctor to prescribe medicines which are listed in schedule 3A; what arrangements he has made to give this information to doctors; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. Kenneth ClarkeWe are still awaiting the response of the General Medical Services Committee of the British Medical Association to the proposals for an 35W appeals mechanism which I put to them on 16 April 1985. Our proposals include the provision of a statutory criterion for prescribing a schedule 3A drug. This would be that it is likely that a particular patient's health would otherwise be adversely affected.
The sub-committee of the family practitioner committee which considered applications to prescribe schedule 3A drugs would be given guidance on the sort of circumstances which would normally meet the criterion. These circumstances would include: that there were known contraindications to all the appropriate drugs on the selected list, because of a prior condition or the treatment for it; that the patient had an established adverse reaction or sensitivity to the available appropriate drugs; that a patient with a chronic or long-term condition had been stabilised with difficulty on a specific drug and changing to a different drug would entail real risks; and that a scheduled drug had a recognised and specific therapeutic effect, not achievable with any normally available drug that was clinically necessary in the case in question.
There is no question of a doctor being able to prescribe a scheduled drug simply because he or the patient preferred it.