UK's NICE turns down Glaxo Tyverb offer

Tue Oct 14, 2008 7:18am EDT
 
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LONDON (Reuters) - Britain's healthcare cost effectiveness watchdog NICE has rebuffed GlaxoSmithKline's latest bid to get its drug Tyverb - for women with advanced breast cancer - into the state health system, the company said on Tuesday.

Glaxo said as part of the ongoing appeal it had offered to run a 12-week trial in women with advanced breast cancer to show the drug is good value for money.

In June, Glaxo received formal European marketing authorization for its new breast cancer pill Tyverb.

Tyverb -- which is already sold as Tykerb in the United States -- is designed to be given in combination with Roche's Xeloda for treating breast cancer patients whose tumors overexpress the HER2 protein.

Glaxo is seeking to convince NICE, which determines whether drugs are cost-effective, to overturn an earlier draft recommendation that the medicine should not be included in the state health system.

NICE is expected to make a final decision at a meeting on November 19.

(Reporting by Ben Deighton, Editing by David Cowell)

 
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