It is part of the National Health Service (NHS), and its role is to provide
patients, health professionals and the public with authoritative, well-researched
and reliable guidance on the best current treatments available - this is known
as "best practice".
The guidance from NICE covers things like medicines, medical devices, diagnostic
techniques, and procedures), but it also deals with the clinical management
of specific conditions.
As part of its work, NICE carries out a programme of appraisals. In each appraisal, NICE looks at a particular area of treatment and gathers together an expert panel who review all of the research evidence in relation to the topic and publish guidance for the NHS. The NICE appraisal on DMDs in MS was one of the first to be completed, and was published in November 2001. NICE also published a general guideline on MS in November 2003.
