The lack of head-to-head randomised trials and the consequences for patients and national health service: The case of non-small cell lung cancer.

There are few head-to-head studies comparing treatments for NSCLC; there are no such studies between the latest generation of drugs. Consequently, ambiguous areas exist due to the lack of comparative studies among the available evidence, preventing the clinician's choice of the most effective treatment and risking the patient receiving suboptimal therapy. Simultaneously, the price of the drug cannot be determined correctly, relying only on indirect evaluations from different trials. To dispel this uncertainty, it would be desirable to initiate a process that brings together the demands derived from clinical practice and clinical research to provide clinicians and patients with the best possible evidence.