To ask the Minister of Health to detail the number of people that have been able to access calcitonin gene-related peptide medications in the South Eastern Health and Social Care Trust in the last five years.

My Department has a formal link with the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) under which NICE Technology Appraisals are reviewed locally for their legal and policy applicability here, and where found to be applicable, they are endorsed for implementation within Health and Social Care (HSC) organisations. In practice, this means that treatments that have been recommended by NICE for routine use in the NHS in England are also available in Northern Ireland. This process is relevant to the commissioning of treatments for migraines including calcitonin gene-related peptide medications.

In the last five years NICE have recommended a number of treatments for migraine which have been endorsed for use in Northern Ireland. It should be noted that most of these treatments are predominately provided within primary care and the SPPG does not hold prescribing data for SEHSCT.

However, the SPPG is able to provide the number of successful Cost-per-Case applications submitted by a secondary care clinician and approved by SPPG. These figures are not likely to represent the total usage of these treatments and it should be noted that a successful CPC application does not guarantee that an individual began treatment.