The function for new treatments and drugs falls to the National Institute for Health and Clinical excellence (NICE)

Any new drug hoping to come onto the market has to be approved by the regulatory authorities.

The European Medicines Agency performs this role for countries within the European Union, however, once they have been inspected as to whether or not they are safe to use and an effective form of treatment, NICE performs the role of deciding which drugs provide the dual role of giving benefit to patients and being good value for the NHS.

The main measure used by NICE in assessing whether drugs are cost effective is known as QALY, short for quality adjusted life year.

It basically balances the expense of the drug against the length of time it is expected to lengthen a person's life.

NICE uses an assumption that any treatment costing £30,000 or less per QALY is cost-effective and whilst other factors come into play, especially for borderline cases, cost-effectiveness is the primary determinant.

This process understandably causes plenty of criticisms of NICE particularly from the terminally ill and their families whose lives may be prolonged by use of some of the rejected drugs.

Reclaim care home fees that have been paid when the care should have been free.