Cancer Jane husband plea to minister

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Mike Tomlinson and members of the Leeds NHS Trust will ask health minister Ann Keen and Government "cancer tsar" Professor Mike Richards to reduce the time taken between drug trials and Government approval.

He will also suggest that provisional licensing should be considered for those cancer drugs which have been licensed in other countries.

Mr Tomlinson said his wife was "let down" by the Government after being forced to travel from Leeds to Nottingham to receive the cancer drug Lapatinib.

Mrs Tomlinson, 43, an NHS radiographer, suffered with cancer for seven years before her death in September this year.

The mother-of-three raised more than £1.75 million for charity in gruelling endurance events including three London Marathons, despite her condition.

She had to make a 150-mile round trip to receive the life-extending drug Lapatinib because the Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust had not taken part in the access study of the treatment.

Her husband said ministers needed to do more to ensure there was equal access for patients in need of drugs which may not have been nationally approved.

"Jane saw the real problem as being the time taken between the drug trials and the licensing," Mr Tomlinson said.

"There is so much money spent on research and then a halt before licensing. All Jane wanted was fair access to life-extending drugs." He added: "The system is not fair if it depends on where you live as to whether you get access to drugs or not."