The case for including antipsychotics in the UK NICE guideline: “Medicines associated with dependence or withdrawal symptoms: safe prescribing and withdrawal management for adults”

ABSTRACT

The UK’s National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) is in the process of writing guidelines for “Medicines Associated with Dependence or Withdrawal Symptoms: Safe Prescribing and Withdrawal Management for Adults”. NICE has excluded antipsychotics, despite inclusion having been requested by all four groups participating in the guideline scoping workshop, as well as the Royal College of Psychiatrists, the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Prescribed Drug Dependence, the International Institute for Psychiatric Drug Withdrawal (IIPDW), Bangor University, Grünenthal Ltd, Pfizer and Mind (the UK’s largest mental health non-profit organisation). The IIPDW subsequently submitted the following request, drafted on their behalf by three researchers with expertise in this field, that NICE review its decision to exclude antipsychotics. The request draws on the recently updated German National Guideline for Schizophrenia. Two additional studies published since the submission, adding weight to the case, are also summarised.

KEYWORDS:

• NICE guidelines
• antipsychotics
• withdrawal symptoms

Disclosure statements

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors. The journal Editor is member of the Board of IIPDW and invited the authors to submit this paper.

Notes

1. The RADAR study reduction manual is unable to be published with this article, however an overview is provided in the RADAR published protocol (Moncrieff et al., 2019).