Review of NICE Technology Appraisal Guidance No 73; myocardial perfusion scintigraphy for the diagnosis and management of angina and myocardial infarction

Proposal to update the review into a clinical guideline

As you may be aware the planned date for review of the above guidance is December 2009.

This is the date at which NICE decides whether sufficient new evidence has emerged for the guidance to be updated.

Having re-looked at the guidance and the possible scope for updating the guidance, we believe that this topic would be better dealt with within the context of a clinical guideline.

We propose that the original guidance be updated by the on-going NICE guideline on the ‘Assessment and investigation of recent onset chest pain of discomfort of suspected cardiac origin’ which is currently due to publish in March 2010. The current appraisal guidance would stand until the time that the new guideline was published; at this point the technology appraisal will be superseded.

In order to be completely confident that this is appropriate, we are asking all relevant consultees and commentators, to inform us of any evidence which will help us decide the best way to update this guidance.  Please see appendix A for a full list of the organisations we have contacted.  Please inform us as soon as possible if we have missed any important organisations from the lists contained within the matrix or included any inappropriately.  This will enable the Institute to involve/remove these organisations much earlier in the appraisal process.

Please note all comments received will be published on the Institute’s website when a decision has been made.

December 2009