The NICE Guidelines Technical Support Unit (TSU) is based within the Centre for Advanced Research Synthesis and Decision Science in the Department of Population Health Sciences, Bristol Medical School. It began in 2011 and is funded by the NICE Centre for Guidelines.

The purpose of the TSU is three-fold:

· To provide rapid response service to NICE and to the National Collaborating Centres on issues relating to evidence synthesis and economic modelling in guidelines,

· To provide training in evidence synthesis and economic modelling for NICE and the National Collaborating Centres,

· To carry out research relevant to evidence synthesis and economic modelling in guidelines.

The TSU consists of core staff from the Multiparameter Evidence Synthesis research group, and a network of internal and external collaborators: including Bristol Appraisal and Review of Research, Health Economics Bristol, Centre for Health Economics, University of York (Professor Mark Sculpher); the School of Health Related Research; University of Sheffield (Dr Sarah Davies, Professor Allan Wailoo) and the Department of Health Sciences, University of Leicester (Professor Keith Abrams).

In Bristol, the TSU is staffed by Professor Nicky Welton (Director and Senior Lead), Dr. Deborah Caldwell (Deputy Director), Professor Tony Ades (Strategic Support), Caitlin Daly (Scientific Coordinator and Statistician), and Hugo Pedder (Statistical and Health Economic Analyst).