Following two days of earlier hearings on the evidence for funding NHS provision of homeopathy, the Select Committee has concluded that the provision of homeopathy should be withdrawn from the NHS, and that homeopathic products should no longer be licensed by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA). The grounds given are that there is insufficient evidence of efficacy of these treatments.
The committee also reported that they could not find any reason to support further research into the efficacy of homeopathic products, in the face of competing priorities. Evidence of the effectiveness of the homeopathic approach and high patient satisfaction rates was countered by one Primary Care Trust’s report on the overall cost effectiveness of routine homeopathic treatment in that region.
On the subject of patient choice the report states “For patient choice to be real choice, patients must be adequately informed to understand the implications of treatments. ” NHS provision, the committee believes, acts as an endorsement of the homeopathic approach and therefore leads patients to make a non-evidenced based choice. The report proposes that if patients know about the lack of evidence for homeopathy, this will diminish homeopathy’s effectiveness and reduce patient demand. The report further recommends a ban on patients choosing homeopathic treatment in proposed NHS personal health budgets.
The safety risks of using homeopathy were agreed to be those where a patient seeks out homeopathic treatment instead of approaching a qualified doctor for a consultation, or a patient is prescribed exclusively homeopathic remedies against recommended conventional medical practice. (Doctors and other healthcare professionals who practice homeopathy can be regulated by the Faculty of Homeopathy. The practice of homeopathy outside of the medical professions is currently unregulated.)
“We conclude that placebos should not be routinely prescribed on the NHS. The funding of homeopathic hospitals—hospitals that specialise in the administration of placebos—should not continue, and NHS doctors should not refer patients to homeopaths. ”
For a discussion of the difference between efficacy and effectiveness in clinical trials see:
http://beta.medicinescomplete.com/journals/fact/current/fact0403a02t01.htm
http://www.kingsfund.org.uk/what_we_do/press/press_releases/complementary_meds.html
Responses to the report are collected here
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