The involvement of patients in Health Technology Assessment

1. The involvement of patients in Health Technology Assessment Andrzej Rys Director Health and Consumers Directorate-General Brussels 18 May 2010

2. Presentation outline • A starting point: core priorities • Why should patients be involved in HTA? • Commission actions to include patient groups in HTA • The way forward on HTA in Europe

3. A starting point: • Three core priorities stated by Commissioner Dalli in the field of health: • Patients first • Innovation in health • Sustainability of health systems

4. All three priorities are highly relevant in the context of Health Technology Assessment: • Patients first: Which health interventions provide the best patient outcome? • Innovation in health: Which innovative technologies contribute most to improved health? Are they better than existing technologies? • Sustainability: An HTA can also include a comparison of the costs involved when using different technologies. This makes it possible to consider how to balance public budgets.

5. When planning health care, European countries have increasingly used Health technology assessments as one of their planning tools the last years. • Issues like the quality of health interventions, the effectiveness of different treatments as well as the need for containing health costs have all triggered this increase. • Used properly, HTA can improve the scientific basis health decision-makers base their policies upon. This includes decisions on whether or not to invest in new technologies.

6. Today's European Union, although having a common market as one of its foundations, is not a common health market. • 27 health systems exist, with their own ways of providing and financing health care. • For industry, this is sometimes seen as a challenge. When they try to get market access for their health innovations, they must work with 27 health systems in parallel. Which in many cases mean that industry must contribute to the production of parallel HTA's.

7. The Commission and the member States themselves believe in the European added value in HTA cooperation: Better coordination and information sharing between Member States is helpful not only for countries with limited HTA resources, but for all member states. • Why? Because it can reduce duplication of work. In addition European cooperation might lead to better HTA's considering rare diseases.

8. Commissioner Dalli has expressed a particular interest in the promotion of the EU cooperation on HTA because he is convinced of the strong added value and of the concrete deliverables that can be reached. • In this respect, Commissioner Dalli and my services are working on long term possible scenarios that could make this cooperation sustainable

9. Why should patients be involved in HTA? • A central element in the Commission's HTA initiatives is to focus on the relative effectiveness of health interventions: Which health innovations contribute to better health outcomes when used in everyday health services?

10. Why should patients be involved in HTA? • DG Sanco has a long tradition of involving European Citizens – be that as consumers or patients. • When addressing the issue of HTA, we believe in the active involvement of patients in HTA undertakings – as individual experts, but also through patient organisations.

11. Commission actions to include patient groups in HTA • The Commission has supported European cooperation on HTA since 2006. Our present main initiative, the Joint Action on HTA 2010-2012, will be presented later today. • I would like to thank EPF for your strong interest in being an active stakeholder in this joint action. • In addition to this, we see the need to increase knowledge of HTA among particularly patient organisations and health professionals. We therefore plan to initiate targeted actions addressing this.

12. The way forward on HTA in Europe • Let me finish by saying a little on future HTA cooperation in Europe. • The Commission believes that a sustainable cooperation structure should be established, and will during the next years consider how this should be organised.

13. The way forward on HTA in Europe • In any case, we find it important that such structure includes a clearly defined and open stakeholder policy – where European patients and their networks have a role to play! • I hope this seminar will increase knowledge among all participants concerning HTA cooperation in Europe, and that it will serve as an impetus for patient organisations particularly in defining their role in European HTA work.