UK's NICE commissions WHO audit

The UK's advisory agency on health and clinical practice is facing an independent peer review from the Geneva-head-quartered World Health Organization. The review, which has been commissioned by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE), will assess the agency's capacities for developing clinical guidelines on the appro-priate treatment and care for specific diseases within the state-sector National Health Service.

The WHO will analyze the NICE's methodology and processes for developing guidelines, as well as examine between five and eight specific cases that were dealt with by the NICE from December 2002 to December 2005.

Mercia Page, the clinical practice center director at the NICE, in a statement said: "NICE is committed to ensuring that its processes and methodologies continue to develop and improve; and to reflect the most up-to-date thinking in guideline developement." Dr Page added that the WHO's evaluation team would consist of five renowned experts in the guildelines field. She said: "I am confident that they will provide a fair assessment of our work and provide valuable feedback that will be used to further improve the quality of our product."