NICE’s proposed guidance for minimising antibiotic prescribing for acute cough attracted the attention of the lay media with the publication of its draft guideline for consultation.
The proposed guidance endorses the advice of professional bodies down the years not to prescribe antibiotics for acute cough (less …

The incidence of stroke and heart attack associated with diabetes will increase by 29% within the next 20 years, the British Heart Foundation (BHF) has predicted.
As the prevalence of obesity continues to increase, the number of people with diabetes is likely to rise by one …

Prescribers should ask patients about their other medication and “where possible” inform the patient’s GP when they prescribe a controlled drug, the Care Quality Commission (CQC) recommends.
This is the first of four equally modest recommendations designed to reduce the potential for harm when using controlled …

Tanezumab, a monoclonal antibody targeted against nerve growth factor, is effective in the treatment of moderate to severe pain associated with osteoarthritis, say manufacturers Pfizer and Lilly.
The companies have reported headline results from a phase 3 trial involving 698 patients with osteoarthritis and pain unresponsive …

NICE guidance on the management of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) recommends referral for psychological interventions such as cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) as a last resort – when a year’s treatment with drugs has failed and symptoms persist (CG61). Investigators from the USA have reported a …

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) says only 58% of pharma companies are on track with their regulatory planning to ensure that their marketing authorisations remain valid once the UK leaves the European Union. Its survey, announced in July, covered 180 companies holding a product licence …

Dementia caused almost one in eight deaths in the UK in 2017, according to official statistics. The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) attribute 67,641 deaths to dementia of all forms in 2017, or 13% of deaths recorded in that year. This …

Nurse practitioners who work independently as a substitute for a doctor in primary care deliver outcomes that are at least as good and possibly better across a range of conditions, say researchers from The Netherlands (Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2018;7:CD001271).
Their systematic review of 18 …

Following a two-part review commissioned by Home Secretary Sajid Javid, the Home Office has decided to reschedule cannabis-derived medicinal products. This means that specialist clinicians will be able to legally prescribe these products by the autumn.
The first part of the review was a report by …

Patients with cancer who use complementary therapies are more likely to refuse conventional treatment for cancer and more likely to die compared with those who do not use them, say US investigators.
Writing in JAMA Oncology (2018; doi:10.1001/jamaoncol.2018.2487), they defined patients using complementary therapy as those …