HTAs

Health Technology Assessment (HTA) is a multidisciplinary process that summarizes information about the medical, social, economic, and ethical implications of adopted health technologies. HTAs are used to inform policy decisions about adoption, reimbursement, and guidelines.

The scope includes clinical effectiveness and safety, economic evaluation, and social, legal, organizational, and ethical impacts. Technologies assessed include pharmaceuticals, medical devices, procedures, screening and diagnostic tests, and sometimes digital health tools and service delivery models.

Process: commissioners or agencies commission HTAs; conduct systematic literature reviews, meta-analyses where possible; gather real-world data; perform economic analyses (cost-effectiveness, budget impact); consider equity, acceptability, feasibility; assemble core evidence tables; expert and patient input; produce appraisal reports and recommendations; transparency and updating.

Jurisdictional context: Most countries have national or regional HTA bodies (NICE, IQWiG, CADTH, HAS, HTA agencies). Decisions may influence reimbursement, formulary placement, and guidelines; HTA reports may be used with conditional approvals or in combination with real-world evidence.

Limitations and debates: Evidence quality, transferability, and uncertainty; time and resource constraints; potential biases; methodological variations; differences between payer decisions and clinical guidelines.