Four ATCM represents attended the NICE Question Time and Public Board meeting at the Education Centre, Conquest Hospital, St Leonards on Sea on 20th July 2016. Mr Bingsheng Yuan, also a member of ATCM, attended the meeting as well.
After the release of the new draft pre-consultation document on Lower Back Pain and Sciatica for consultation by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) on 8th Feb 2016, a special council meeting was held on 10th April 2016. On the meeting, all the concerned issues raised in the new draft guideline were discussed thoroughly.
In order to give an appropriate response on this consultation, ATCM president Dr Kaicun Zhao, Education Executive Dr Fanyi Meng, and Research Executive Dr Tiejun Tang represent ATCM council started the preparation work against the new draft guideline after the council meeting. They have spent a lot of time to carefully study the documents which comprise of more than 2,000 pages. With great helps from ATCM members Dr Di Wu, Dr Kexia Xu and Dr Lin Cai, on 20th July NICE Question Time and Public Board meeting, 4 ATCM represents raised their concerns and expressed ATCM’s arguments and statements against the new draft guideline to the NICE board members.
NICE’s proposal not to recommend acupuncture for lower back pain in the new draft guideline was based on biased information against acupuncture and mis-conducted data analysis. Therefore the new draft guideline is unfair, unscientific and statistically wrong. In addition, we must point out that in the new draft guideline the frontline practitioners audit response has been neglected and patients’ feedback has been ignored.