<2>Menopause: NICE Approves Daily Pill for Hot Flushes
<3>Breakthrough in Menopause Treatment
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) has recommended a new non-hormonal daily pill, Fezolinetant (Veoza), for the treatment of moderate to severe vasomotor symptoms caused by menopause. This pill, made by Astellas Pharma, can now be prescribed on the NHS when hormone replacement therapy (HRT) is not suitable.
<4>According to NICE, around 500,000 women in England and Wales are eligible to benefit from this new treatment. Fezolinetant was approved by the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency in December 2023.
<5>Fezolinetant works by blocking the nerve pathways in the brain that trigger vasomotor symptoms. A 45 mg tablet is taken once a day. The evidence supporting NICE’s decision comes from the Daylight, Skylight 1, and Skylight 2 clinical trials, which all reported a significant reduction in vasomotor symptom frequency and severity compared with placebo.
<6>For example, the Daylight trial, published in The BMJ, found that Fezolinetant