Improving decision-making based on Health Technology Assessment

HTA (Health Technology Assessment) is used to evaluate the (un)desired effects of health care technology for health care decision-making. Ecorys recently studied the role of HTA around reimbursement decisions in 10 countries.

For this purpose, an evaluation framework was drawn up to find out to what extent existing HTA practices apply new insights around legitimacy and transparency in decision-making, among others.

Based on desk research combined with interviews with relevant stakeholders, it is found that HTA practices in Canada, Scotland and England are most in line with the evaluation framework. Australia, Germany and France follow closely behind, while Argentina and South Korea are at the beginning. Brazil and Thailand occupy a middle position. However, all countries can still improve in certain areas. This is especially true in the areas of 1) scoping, 2) involvement of relevant stakeholders, 3) inclusion of relevant patient characteristics and 4) monitoring and evaluation of reimbursement decisions.