Oxycodone: where the agencies disagree
This page collects every recorded health technology assessment decision for one molecule across the agencies in our archive, and compares them. The comparison is the point: each agency publishes its own verdict, none publishes how that verdict sits against the others.
What the record shows
PBAC (Australia), PHARMAC (New Zealand) and SMC (Scotland) recommended or restricted oxycodone, while AWMSG (Wales) did not recommend it.
On the same population the two systems disagree outright: SMC (Scotland) recorded restricted for “moderate to severe pain in patients with cancer.”, while AWMSG (Wales) recorded not recommended for “For the treatment of moderate to severe pain in patients with cancer and postoperative pain and treatment of severe pain…”.
HAS (France) has been harder on oxycodone than on its own caseload: it refused 5 of 9 decisive submissions here (56%), against a base rate of 11% across everything it has assessed.
The file has been open for more than a decade: 15.8 years separate the first record, 20 May 2004 at PHARMAC (New Zealand), from the most recent, 4 Mar 2020 at HAS (France).
No assessment is on file from TLV (Sweden), CIPM (Spain) and G-BA (Germany), each among the eight highest-volume agencies here.
Not every gap is a refusal: for oxycodone, 1 submission was never made — an outcome set by the company rather than the assessor.
Nothing has been added since 2020; on this evidence the file is dormant.
7 distinct indication wordings are recorded for oxycodone by the agencies that label one in English (AWMSG, PBAC and SMC).
5 of these 22 records carry a year of decision but no day, so any interval quoted here is approximate to within a year.
PHARMAC (New Zealand) was first to assess oxycodone, on 20 May 2004; PBAC (Australia) did not open a file until 2014 — an unusually long tail of 10.2 years between the earliest and latest system to look at it.
The record arrives in waves: 7 separate years each carry two or more decisions, spread across 13 years in total.
4 of the 5 agencies here assessed oxycodone more than once, HAS (France) most often at 11 entries — repeat review is the norm for this molecule rather than the exception.
Coverage is narrow: only 5 of the 18 agencies here have assessed oxycodone.
The full ledger for oxycodone reads 7 recommended, 6 not recommended, 2 advice and 2 restricted, with 5 in other categories.
Decisions on file
| Agency | Date | Indication as recorded | Outcome | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| HAS (France) | 4 Mar 2020 | Listing (Transparency Committee) | SMR substantial · ASMR V | source |
| AWMSG (Wales) | 15 Mar 2017 | In adults, and adolescents aged 12 years and older for the treatment of severe pain, which can be adequately managed onl… | outside AWMSG criteria | source |
| PBAC (Australia) | 2015 | Pain | The PBAC rejected the proposed General schedule listing of the oxycodone 5 mg strength. Th… | source |
| SMC (Scotland) | 8 Nov 2010 | moderate to severe pain in patients with cancer. | accepted (restricted) | source |
| PHARMAC (New Zealand) | 20 May 2004 | Pain | PTAC advice: Medium · decision reached | source |
17 further decisions for oxycodone, across 4 agencies, are not shown here. They link to 12 further source documents.
Related molecules
- fentanyl — same ATC class N02A — Analgesics
- tramadol — same ATC class N02A — Analgesics
- morphine — same ATC class N02A — Analgesics
- hydromorphone — same ATC class N02A — Analgesics
- teriparatide — also decided by HAS in 2020Q1
- epoetin alfa — also decided by HAS in 2020Q1
Coverage: 22 decisions for oxycodone from 5 agencies, 2004 to 2020. Data to 7 Sep 2026. ATC class N02A — Analgesics. How this page is produced. Compiled by Altima Partners; queries: sales@altimapartners.co.uk.