The basic task of any economic evaluation in a health technology assessment framework is to identify, measure, value, and compare the costs and benefits of health interventions being considered. However, benefit assessment is one of the greatest challenges facing economists. In recent years, the interest in valuing the benefits of health interventions has shifted from the quality-adjusted-life-year (QALY; health benefit only) model, towards capturing the full benefit of interventions and the value these benefits receive in different contexts.
Additionally, insights into full benefit assessment at a patient level -so-called patients’ preferences- should overcome the fact that many health interventions are used by patients in a different way than clinically recommended. Furthermore, while patients’ happiness or life satisfaction offer an alternative outcomes measures potentially capturing the full benefit of health interventions, these measures are also known to be volatile over time with patients adapting to their (ill) health.
All in all, a broader evaluative framework is required, with outcomes measured in terms of overall quality of life (i.e., wellbeing). This framework would include patient preferences and it should take into account the way people adapt to a health and wellbeing status. Such a framework is expected to contribute to more informed decision-making, and to optimise uptake, adherence, and patient satisfaction.
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Read more about steering group member Job van Exel.
Job van Exel is Professor of Economics & Values at Erasmus School of Economics and the Erasmus School of Health Policy & Management. His research focuses on the measurement and valuation of health and wellbeing benefits, preferences about the distribution of health and healthcare, and determinants and outcomes of health behaviors.
Read more about Action Line Leader Esther de Bekker-Grob.
Esther de Bekker-Grob is Associate Professor of Health Economics and Health Preferences in the Erasmus School of Health Policy & Management at Erasmus University Rotterdam. Additionally, she is co-director of the interfaculty Erasmus Choice Modelling Centre. Her research interests and contributions are in the areas of benefit assessment, choice behaviour, economic evaluations and health preference research, both methodological and applied, as a response to the strong push towards personalised medicine as well as dealing with scarcity in the allocation of healthcare.
Read more about the PhD candidates of this Action Line.
Måns Abrahamson Is a PhD student at Erasmus School of Philosophy. He studied economics and philosophy at Lund University (SE) and later at Erasmus University Rotterdam. Måns’ research is concerned with the use of laundered preferences as indicators of well-being in health care. More specifically, he is interested in the desiderata for the effects of, and the methods used in, the preference-laundering process in order to better evaluate (the allocation of) health care.
Friederike Benning is a PhD candidate at Erasmus School of Health Policy and Management. Her research focuses on developing a measure of wellbeing for use in economic evaluations of health and social care interventions. The demand for health and social care services continues to rise. Due to the scarcity of available resources, it is important to compare the costs and benefits of different allocation decisions in order to support decision makers in enhancing societal wellbeing. Her more general research interests are economic evaluations, especially in the measurement and valuation of wellbeing. She is also a member of the Erasmus Choice Modelling Centre.
Samare Huls is a PhD candidate at Erasmus School of Health Policy and Management. The main aim of her PhD topic at ESHPM is to advance the field of patient preferences in terms of internal and external validity by doing mostly quantitative and methodological research. Integrating patient preferences in health technology assessment is argued to improve uptake, adherence, and patient satisfaction. It should lead to more informed decision-making concerning coverage and reimbursement decision. On a more general level, her research interests are applying behavioural and experimental economics, as well as data science to the field of health.
Jannis Stöckel is a PhD Candidate in the Health Economics section of the Erasmus School of Health Policy & Management. His research revolves around methodological issues regarding the utilisation of subjective wellbeing measures in health economic evaluations and the measurement of spillover effects on for instance informal family caregivers. His broader research interests include applied econometrics with a focus on the economics of ageing and long-term care related topics.
Read more about our affiliated researchers: Werner Brouwer, Stefan Sleijfer, Joffre Swait, Carin Uyl-de Groot and Jack Vromen.
Werner Brouwer is a Professor of Health Economics at Erasmus School of Health Policy & Management. Furthermore, Werner is affiliated with the institute for Medical Technology Assessment and the Erasmus School of Economics, both of the Erasmus University Rotterdam. He is an Honorary University Professor at Corvinus University Budapest, associate editor of Health Economics, and editorial board member of the European Journal of Health Economics and PharmacoEconomics. His research interests include methodology of economic evaluation in health care and the link between economic evaluation and health policy.
More information will follow soon.
Read more about the postdoctoral researchers of this Action Line.
Daphne Voormolen is a Postdoctoral Researcher at Erasmus School of Health Policy and Management. Her research focuses on developing a measure of wellbeing for use in economic evaluations of health and social care interventions. The demand for health and social care services continues to rise. Due to the scarcity of available resources, it is important to compare the costs and benefits of different allocation decisions in order to support decision makers in enhancing societal wellbeing. She obtained her PhD in October 2020 and her thesis was titled: “Outcome following Traumatic Brian Injury – Assessment and Preferences”. Her more general research interests are quality of life, and outcome measurement and assessment.