DESCRIBE DECISION-MAKING SYSTEMS, ASSESS HEALTH TECHNOLOGY ASSESSMENT REPORTS

2012 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 168-168 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chris Henshall

The paper by Drummond et al. in this issue of the Journal discusses how the principles that have been proposed in previous papers by these authors might be used as the basis for benchmarking health technology assessment (HTA) organizations. This raises a number of important issues, some acknowledged and discussed by the authors, and some not. The commentary by Sampietro provides an analysis of many of these. Two issues strike me as fundamental in this debate: the need for an agreed and objective approach to describing health system decision-making systems; and the need for an agreed and objective approach to the assessment of the quality of HTA reports to support specific decisions.

2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (6) ◽  
pp. 288-292
Author(s):  
Christopher McCabe ◽  
Jeff Round

Health Technology Assessment (HTA) has always sought to incorporate the evidence of all patients affected in the decision-making process. While health system budgets could increase to cover costs of new technologies, the relevant patients are those benefitting from access to the technology being appraised. More recently, with health system budgets effectively fixed, costs of new technologies are covered by displacing other, currently funded care. This reallocation means the patients affected by the decision include those whose healthcare is displaced. These patients are typically unidentified, however, and so HTA in this instance involves choosing between identified and unidentified patients. We argue that HTA should take account of identifiability bias in this decision-making, to avoid promoting inequitable and inefficient access to healthcare.


1997 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 186-219 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alessandro Liberati ◽  
Trevor A. Sheldon ◽  
H. David Banta

Health technology assessment (HTA) is primarily concerned with the consequences (benefits and costs) of health care and health policy decisions. Because decision making is complex and outcomes are often uncertain, it is helpful to attempt to assess the consequences. The quality of decisions can be improved by a process that provides a consistent framework for identifying and assessing health technologies.


2020 ◽  
Vol 36 (S1) ◽  
pp. 38-38
Author(s):  
Maíra Catharina Ramos ◽  
Margarete Martins de Oliveira ◽  
Erica Tatiane da Silva ◽  
Daniella Cristina Rodrigues Pereira ◽  
Flávia Tavares da Silva Elias

IntroductionThe interaction of health technology assessment (HTA) and health regulatory agencies has been widespread, especially for decision-making in health system coverage. The objective of this paper is to report the HTA-regulatory interaction in Brazil.MethodsThis is a case study on the interaction between HTA and regulation in Brazil. Technical documents and Brazilian legislation on health regulation and HTA were analyzed. The study was conducted in July 2019.ResultsHTA-Regulatory Interaction in Brazil is still incipient. There is no responsible agency for interaction between agencies, as there is in Europe and Canada, for example. In the last 4 years, cooperation has started between the Brazilian Health Surveillance Agency (Anvisa) and the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz) for post-registration monitoring of medicines. During this partnership, 170 post-marketing drug opinions were prepared, assisting the regulatory agency in decision-making.ConclusionsBrazil legislation guarantees essential medicines at low cost or free. The interaction between HTA and regulation has the potential to reduce the time taken to incorporate technology to the patient, in addition to ensuring greater safety for users of the Unified Health System. In this sense, it was observed that the interaction between health regulation and science and technology institutions has innovative potential in this approach.


2017 ◽  
Vol 33 (S1) ◽  
pp. 179-180 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Addo ◽  
Jane Hall ◽  
Stephen Goodall ◽  
Marion Haas

INTRODUCTION:In recent years, the Ghana health system has been faced with the challenge of financial sustainability. New ways of making decisions in a cost-effective manner that ensure efficient use of available resources is being explored. Consequently, Ghana has been pursuing the formal introduction of Health Technology Assessment (HTA) for decision making in the health system.However, the limited use and impact of HTA on health systems has been associated with reasons including, and not restricted to, the knowledge and perception of decision makers towards it (1-3). Therefore as Ghana gears towards using HTA formally, it is important to assess the knowledge and attitude of potential users and producers of HTA. This will provide useful information for the setting up of an HTA agency.METHODS:A qualitative research approach using in-depth interviews was utilized. Twenty-three decision makers both at the national and district levels, and four researchers were interviewed. Thematic analysis was conducted using NVivo software.RESULTS:Only seven respondents had knowledge about HTA. Respondents perceived HTA differently, and the word ‘technology’, was often misconstrued as a device for communication such as mobile phone. Two main barriers to the use of HTA emerged; lack of resources (human, data, and finance) and politico-cultural issues. To address these barriers respondents recommended that stakeholders be involved in decisions concerning the guidelines for its conduct, composition of the appraisal team, and the focus of HTA. Generating of human, data and financial resources were also indicated.CONCLUSIONS:There is paucity of knowledge about HTA in Ghana. For Ghana to successfully introduce HTA for health decision making and realize its expected benefits, there will be a need to address the perceived barriers in a comprehensive manner. Also, to mitigate data and human resource barrier, Ghana will have to examine the available local data and human resource to build on.


Author(s):  
Brian O'Rourke ◽  
Sophie Söderholm Werkö ◽  
Tracy Merlin ◽  
Li Ying Huang ◽  
Tara Schuller

The International Network of Agencies for Health Technology Assessment (INAHTA) spans the globe as a network of 50 publicly-funded health technology assessment (HTA) agencies supporting health system decision making for 1.4 billion people in thirty countries. Agency members are non-profit HTA organizations that are part of, or directly support, regional or national governments. Recently, INAHTA surveyed its members to gather perspectives from agency leadership on the most important issues in HTA today. This paper describes the top 10 challenges identified by INAHTA members. Addressing these challenges requires a call for action from INAHTA member agencies and the many other actors involved in the HTA ecosystem. In opening this call for action, INAHTA will lead the way; however, a comprehensive undertaking from all players is needed to effectively address these challenges and to continue to evolve HTA in its role as a strong and effective contributor to health systems.


2010 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 309-316 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katrine B. Frønsdal ◽  
Karen Facey ◽  
Marianne Klemp ◽  
Inger Natvig Norderhaug ◽  
Berit Mørland ◽  
...  

Background: The way in which a health technology is used in any particular health system depends on the decisions and actions of a variety of stakeholders, the local culture, and context. In 2009, the HTAi Policy Forum considered how health technology assessment (HTA) could be improved to optimize the use of technologies (in terms of uptake, change in use, or disinvestment) in such complex systems.Methods: In scoping, it was agreed to focus on initiatives to implement evidence-based guidance and monitoring activities. A review identified systematic reviews of implementation initiatives and monitoring activities. A two-day deliberative workshop was held to discuss key papers, members’ experiences, and collectively address key questions. This consensus paper was developed by email and finalized at a postworkshop meeting.Results: Evidence suggests that the impact and use of HTA could be increased by ensuring timely delivery of relevant reports to clearly determined policy receptor (decision-making) points. To achieve this, the breadth of assessment, implementation initiatives such as incentives and targeted, intelligent dissemination of HTA result, needs to be considered. HTA stakeholders undertake a variety of monitoring activities, which could inform optimal use of a technology. However, the quality of these data varies and is often not submitted to an HTA.Conclusions: Monitoring data should be sufficiently robust so that they can be used in HTA to inform optimal use of technology. Evidence-based implementation initiatives should be developed for HTA, to better inform decision makers at all levels in a health system about the optimal use of technology.


2021 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Samantha Hollingworth ◽  
Ama Pokuaa Fenny ◽  
Su-Yeon Yu ◽  
Francis Ruiz ◽  
Kalipso Chalkidou

Abstract Background Countries in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) are moving towards universal health coverage. The process of Health Technology Assessment (HTA) can support decisions relating to benefit package design and service coverage. HTA involves institutional cooperation with agreed methods and procedural standards. We systematically reviewed the literature on policies and capacity building to support HTA institutionalisation in SSA. Methods We systematically reviewed the literature by searching major databases (PubMed, Embase, etc.) until June 2019 using terms considering three aspects: HTA; health policy, decision making; and SSA. We quantitatively extracted and descriptively analysed content and conducted a narrative synthesis eliciting themes from the selected literature, which varied in study type and apporach. Results Half of the 49 papers identified were primary research studies and mostly qualitative. Five countries were represented in six of ten studies; South Africa, Ghana, Uganda, Cameroon, and Ethiopia. Half of first authors were from SSA. Most informants were policy makers. Five themes emerged: (1) use of HTA; (2) decision-making in HTA; (3) values and criteria for setting priority areas in HTA; (4) involving stakeholders in HTA; and (5) specific examples of progress in HTA in SSA. The first one was the main theme where there was little use of evidence and research in making policy. The awareness of HTA and economic evaluation was low, with inadequate expertise and a lack of local data and tools. Conclusions Despite growing interest in HTA in SSA countries, awareness remains low and HTA-related activities are uncoordinated and often disconnected from policy. Further training and skills development are needed, firmly linked to a strategy focusing on strengthening within-country partnerships, particularly among researchers and policy makers. The international community has an important role here by supporting policy- relevant technical assistance, highlighting that sustainable financing demands evidence-based processes for effective resource allocation, and catalysing knowledge-sharing opportunities among countries facing similar challenges.


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