Message #2662

[EliB]

Had typed out a reply to this already but lost it all!!! 

ANYway.....I think this is a totally different situation - as you say, Jan, there are other options available for weight loss other than gastric band ops (LOTS of them!) but this is the ONE and ONLY chance this man has got of saving his sight! A committee are refusing it because there's not ENOUGH evidence to say that it works. Therefore there must be SOME evidence to say that it does....if you're facing losing your sight then you'll try anything, no matter how low the odds!
And if there IS some evidence to say that it works, then that should be sufficient. This could get taken to ridiculous degrees....unless something is 95+% going to work then we're not going to fund it!!! How many people get treatments, for all kinds of illnesses, which are administered more in hope than anything else?
This is a situation that ANY of us could find ourselves in - and that's scary!!! Not to mention unacceptable!!!

I don't know whether refusal of medical treatment falls under the actual legislation of the HR Bill (as opposed to the "that's against my human rights" chant that too many folk come out with these days!!) but it is SURELY against the principle of the NHS!