Decision Modelling for Health Economic Evaluation

In financially constrained health systems across the world, increasing emphasis is being placed on the ability to demonstrate that health care interventions are not only effective, but also cost-effective. This book deals with decision modelling techniques that can be used to estimate the value for money of various interventions including medical devices, surgical procedures, diagnostic technologies, and pharmaceuticals. Particular emphasis is placed on the importance of the appropriate representation of uncertainty in the evaluative process and the implication this uncertainty has for decision making and the need for future research. This highly practical guide takes the reader through the key principles and approaches of modelling techniques. It begins with the basics of constructing different forms of the model, the population of the model with input parameter estimates, analysis of the results, and progression to the holistic view of models as a valuable tool for informing future research exercises. Case studies and exercises are supported with online templates and solutions. This book will help analysts understand the contribution of decision-analytic modelling to the evaluation of health care programmes. ABOUT THE SERIES: Economic evaluation of health interventions is a growing specialist field, and this series of practical handbooks will tackle, in-depth, topics superficially addressed in more general health economics books. Each volume will include illustrative material, case histories and worked examples to encourage the reader to apply the methods discussed, with supporting material provided online. This series is aimed at health economists in academia, the pharmaceutical industry and the health sector, those on advanced health economics courses, and health researchers in associated fields.

1 - Introduction
2 - Key aspects of decision modelling for economic evaluation
3 - Further developments in decision analytic models for economic evaluation
4 - Making decision models probabilistic
5 - Analysing and presenting simulation output from probabilistic models
6 - Decision-making, uncertainty and the value of information
7 - Efficient research design
8 - Future challenges for cost-effectiveness modelling of health care interventions

Andrew Briggs was appointed to the Lindsay Chair in Health Policy and Economic Evaluation in June 2005. Previously he held the position of Reader in Health Economics at the University of Oxford's Health Economic Research Centre (HERC). Karl Claxton holds an adjunct appointment at Harvard as an Assistant Professor of Health and Decision Sciences. He is part of a committee that appraises new and existing health care technologies and issues guidance for the NHS on the use of these technologies. He has also contributed to the Task Group which developed guidance for the appraisal of health technologies for NICE. He is co-editor of the Journal of Health Economics. Mark Sculpher is Director of the Programme on Economic Evaluation and Health Technology Assessment at the University of York. He has previously worked at the Health Economics Research Group at Brunel University, and in the Department of Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics at McMaster University in Canada. He is a member of the NICE Technology Appraisal Committee and he chaired NICE's Task Group on methods guidance for economic evaluation. He is also a member of the Commissioning Board for the NHS Health Technology Assessment programme. He is on the editorial boards of Medical Decision Making, Health Expectations and the Journal of Applied Health Economics and Policy.