ABSTRACT
National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) is an independent organisation responsible for providing national guidance on promoting good health and preventing and treating ill health in England and Wales. NICE aims to speed the uptake of interventions that are both clinically and cost effective. All NICE advisory bodies contain healthcare academics, professionals, industry representatives, patients and where appropriate, the general public. NICE has now produced guidance in most fields of healthcare and public health. Although NICE does not have responsibility for ensuring that its guidance is put into practice it soon became apparent that more support for implementation in the National Health Service was required. The most important recommendations from NICE's perspective were recommendations for enhancing drug development and the uptake of clinically effective and cost-effective new technologies. NICE has also led the exploration of a 'fit-for-purpose' approach to the collection of data rather than the traditional hierarchical approach.
