PharmacoEconomics & Outcomes News 280 - 16 Sep 2000

Most decision-makers valueeconomic evaluations

Economic evaluations, for the most part, are viewedwith a positive attitude by the world’s decision-makers,according to a team of investigators from TheNetherlands.*

They conducted interviews and surveys withphysicians, hospital pharmacists, regulators andpoliticians in The Netherlands to gain insight into theirattitudes, knowledge and actual use of economicevaluations, and compared the results with the opinionsof their European colleagues.**

All respondents cited efficacy and ‘safety’ asimportant aspects of an assessment of a new healthcaretechnology, while about 75% reported that costs,savings, cost effectiveness and budget impact were thefactors on which they would base their judgements.However, when asked if the use of economicevaluations was a formal requirement for the decision-making process in their situation, all but 1 respondentanswered ‘no’. Nevertheless, it was revealed that about75% of decision-makers in The Netherlands and Europebelieved that economic considerations should be takeninto account, at least to some extent.

Several barriers to considerA range of responses were gleaned from respondents

regarding real and potential barriers to the use ofeconomic evaluations in decision support. However, 3were identified as being the most important by allgroups of decision-makers:• the difficulty of moving resources from 1 budget to

another• cost effectiveness in real practice can be very

different from that predicted in a clinical trial (i.e. theefficacy versus effectiveness debate)

• economic evaluations make too many assumptions.Further, a number of potential barriers to using

economic evaluations were added to the list by therespondents themselves, and included:• the medical profession do not accept economic

evaluations as a tool• ‘nonproductive’ populations and people with a

lower starting utility are discriminated against• the lack of available studies at present• the high level of resources and time required to

perform an economic evaluation.* see also PharmacoEconomics & Outcomes News 272: 3, 22 Jul2000: 800763513** European results were obtained from the 9 European countriesparticipating in the European Network on Methodology andApplication of Economic Evaluation Techniques (EUROMET) project.

Zwart-van Rijkom JEF, et al. Differences in attitudes, knowledge and use ofeconomic evaluations in decision-making in the Netherlands: the Dutch resultsfrom the EUROMET project. PharmacoEconomics 18: 149-160, Aug2000 800810657

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PharmacoEconomics & Outcomes News 16 Sep 2000 No. 2801173-5503/10/0280-0001/$14.95 Adis © 2010 Springer International Publishing AG. All rights reserved