RCOphth Commissioning Guide for Adult Cataract Revised January 2018

21 February 2018

The RCOphth Commissioning Guide for Adult Cataract aims to provide patients and the public, health and social care professionals, commissioners and service providers with a clear description of what constitutes a high-quality service. The guidance helps an organisation to assess its current performance against evidence-based measures of best practice and identify priorities for improvement in the management of cataract care pathways.

These guidelines include recommendations on the standards that Commissioners should expect from any provider of cataract surgery; providing evidence-based guidance to support the commissioning of high quality cataract services and to promote equity of access to the treatment of visual impairment caused by cataract.

Acknowledging the variation in commissioning policy for cataract surgery across England, The National Institute of Health and Care Excellence (NICE) has published ‘Cataracts in adults: management’. Following detailed health economic modelling, a key recommendation of the NICE guideline is that arbitrary thresholds of visual acuity should not be used to restrict access to cataract surgery.