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Publicly funded cancer medicines listed on the New Zealand Pharmaceutical Schedule were compared with those listed on the Australian Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme. To quantify the health gains offered by the cancer medicines funded in Australia but not in New Zealand, clinical trial data reporting median progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) were sought. The differences in the median PFS and OS for the unfunded medicines, relative to the comparator medicine funded in NZ, were then assessed against the American Society of Clinical Oncology Cancer Research Committee (ASCO-CRC) recommended targets for clinically meaningful health gains. Our analysis confirms that, whilst New Zealand funds fewer cancer medicines than Australia, most of the additional medicines funded in Australia do not deliver clinically meaningful health gains as defined by the ASCO-CRC guidance. This suggests that New Zealand is not missing substantive opportunities for improvements to New Zealand's cancer survival rates through additional medicines funding. A policy of funding more new cancer medicines in order to achieve numerical parity with Australia or other countries would not result in substantive health improvement and would cost significantly more, and investing the millions of dollars needed to achieve funding parity with other countries would not represent good value for money in terms of delivering the best health outcomes for all New Zealanders, rather selective funding of new medicines that demonstrate clear clinical benefit and that are cost-effective and affordable is the sensible approach., (Copyright © 2016 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Purpose: We present a review of radionuclide imaging of tumour vascular physiology as it relates to angiogenesis. We focus on clinical trials in human subjects using PET and SPECT to evaluate tumour physiology, in particular blood flow and hypoxia., Methods: A systematic review of literature based on MEDLINE searches updated in February 2010 was performed., Results: Twenty-nine studies were identified for review: 14 dealt with (15)O-water PET perfusion imaging, while 8 dealt with (18)F-fluoromisonidazole PET hypoxia imaging. Five used SPECT methods. The studies varied widely in technical quality and reporting of methods., Conclusions: A subset of radionuclide methods offers accurate quantitative scientific observations on tumour vascular physiology of relevance to angiogenesis and its treatment. The relationship between cellular processes of angiogenesis and changing physiological function remains poorly defined. The promise of quantitative functional imaging at high specificity and low administered dose sustains interest in radionuclide methods.

The primary physiological function of the vasculature is to support perfusion, the nutritive flow of blood through the tissues. Vascular physiology can be studied non-invasively in human subjects using imaging methods such as positron emission tomography (PET), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), X-ray computed tomography (CT), and Doppler ultrasound (DU). We describe the physiological rationale for imaging vascular physiology with these methods. We review the published data on repeatability. We review the literature on 'before-and-after' studies using these methods to monitor response to treatment in human subjects, in five broad clinical settings: (1) antiangiogenic agents, (2) vascular disruptive agents, (3) conventional cytotoxic drugs, (4) radiation treatment, and (5) agents affecting drug delivery. We argue that imaging of vascular physiology offers an attractive 'functional endpoint' for clinical trials of anticancer treatment. More conventional measures of tumour response, such as size criteria and the uptake of fluorodeoxyglucose, may be insensitive to therapeutically important changes in vascular function.