France Clarifies Its Health Technology Assessment Process
France's cost containment agency, the National Authority for Health (HAS), recently released guidance on the methods that it uses when it conducts "economic evaluations" of medicines and medical devices.
The document explains the basic methodology that HAS uses in the economic evaluations that allow health interventions to be compared on the basis of their health effects and costs. The methodology used is the "reference case analysis" that is adaptable to the specific features of a particular evaluation or to so-called operational difficulties.
Under the reference case analysis, certain guidelines are "required" systematically in the evaluation, whereas others are "preferred" but may not be followed. HAS underscores in the guidance that economic evaluation in France is still in the development phase and that difficulties such as the lack of available data limit the strict application of its methodological principles.
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