A SCHEME to monitor multiple sclerosis patients while on a course of life-changing drugs is not yet fully operational in York and North Yorkshire because recruitment of key staff has yet to take place.

A small number of patients have already been prescribed Beta Interferon - hailed as the first drug to improve MS symptoms - but the drug is being prescribed "on a more modest basis" than if a consultant neurologist and support staff had already been employed.

It could be months before the right candidate is in place, but health chiefs are confident that everything will go to plan and the scheme will soon be fully operational.

Patients have been battling to get NHS access to Beta Interferon after many health authorities refused to prescribe it because the cost of £10,000 per patient per year was not justified by the results.

The Government decided to make the drug, and the similar glatiramer acetate, available on the NHS from May last year despite a ruling by its own health standards body NICE (National Institute for Clinical Excellence) that the drugs were not cost-effective. A unique "payment by results" agreement between the Government and five pharmaceutical companies means that prices would be reduced if patients did not improve during a ten-year monitoring programme.

But for this monitoring to take place extra staff had to be employed in York in order to cope with the extra work.

Andrew Bertran, directorate manager for medicine at York Health Services NHS Trust, said the funding had to be put in place and approval given for the new post before any jobs could be advertised.

He said: "The reason we are starting now is because we have got the agreements and building blocks in place regarding the recruitment.

"We couldn't put patients on the scheme without having the commitment to do that.

"There is considerable monitoring involved with patients coming in throughout the year for assessments and follow-ups as well as their annual checks.

"And as we build our cohort of patients that number snowballs.

"We can only start the scheme now even though we haven't got the consultant neurologist because we know the staff are coming."

Mr Bertran said that although patients in the area have had to wait for access to the drugs, other trusts across the UK were having more difficulty implementing the scheme.

He said: "Other trusts don't have the plans in place as we do now.

"But there are a number of trusts around the country who already have that infrastructure, they are much bigger than us and are already providing this treatment for a significant number of patients.

"Implementing the Department of Health scheme has proved less an issue for them, whatever their reasons are."

Updated: 09:34 Monday, January 20, 2003