Patients, the Public and Priorities in Healthcare

Sharing the costs of ill health is the mark of a civilised society. However, every society has limited healthcare resources, and must therefore make finely balanced decisions on how best to allocate them. The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) has been responsible for the UK's health resource allocation for a decade. To inform its decisions, a Citizens Council of 30 members of the general public was established by NICE to gauge the underlying values of the society it se