OBJECTIVES The aim of this study was to develop criteria for the prioritization of topics for health technology assessment (HTA) in the healthcare system of Kazakhstan. METHODS Initial proposals for criteria were suggested through consultation with Ministry of Health (MoH) policy areas. These were refined through a workshop attended by HTA department staff, persons from medical universities a...

OBJECTIVES The current and past situation of health technology assessment (HTA) in Catalonia is presented in this study. METHODS The approach used here is a historical review of facts and landmarks. RESULTS Spain has undergone radical change in many aspects, but the changes in healthcare provision have been major indeed. Catalonia has had the ability to benefit from these changes and has be...

A major driver of cost growth in health care is the rapid increase in the utilisation of existing technology and not simply the adoption of new technology. Health economists and their health technology assessment colleagues have become obsessed by technology adoption questions and have largely ignored 'technology management' questions. Technology management would include the life-cycle assessme...

OBJECTIVES Although health technology assessment (HTA) has been well established in all developed countries, it has not found a firm footing in many developing countries. This is especially true of the Asia Pacific region, which has much of the world population. METHODS The beginnings of HTA in this region go back to the work of Dr. David Banta in China and the establishment of the Asian HTA ...

Lessons from health technology assessment (HTA) organizations around the world are emerging, and only some of them are about evidence. Other lessons pertain to governance, communication, trust, politics, and the persistence of local “practice patterns” for evidence evaluations. This should not come as a surprise. HTA organizations worldwide have different constituencies and organizational struc...

In Hungary, the history of the health technology assessment (HTA) dates back to 1993 when HTA and related activities started by professional initiatives. The legal background, institutionalization, and training capacities were created between 1998 and 2004. The main challenges for HTA in Hungary are partly similar to the ones in countries with a developed economy; no question it is time for cos...

BACKGROUND In conjunction with other important movements in contemporary medicine, including evidence-based medicine (EBM), health technology assessment (HTA) has promoted a culture of critical evaluation. Despite this impact, institutional and methodological challenges are associated with HTA. For example, only in recent years has HTA attempted an open dialogue with patients; however, this is ...

Priority setting for the evaluation of health technologies in the Netherlands is exclusively based on the scientific merits of individual research proposals. This process has not resulted in satisfactory allocation of resources. Therefore, societal criteria for setting priorities for health technology assessment have been proposed as an adjunct to scientific criteria. These societal criteria in...

Meta-analyses are used to synthesize treatment information through application of statistical methods during all phases of clinical research and development, especially in the context of health technology assessment of the relative effectiveness between two treatments across trials as well as in drug reimbursement applications.1 The consistency of the treatment effect between groups of trials c...

There seems to be a general agreement amongst practitioners of economic evaluations, including Health Technology Assessment, that the explicit statement of a perspective is a necessary element in designing and reporting research. Moreover, there seems also to be a general presumption that the ideal perspective is “societal”. In this paper we endorse the first principle but dissent from the seco...