PURPOSE: Equity continues to be a significant area of HEOR research. This workshop will describe what methods are available to address equity in health technology assessment (HTA) and discuss how and to what extent HTA agencies should consider equity. It will also explore the opportunities and challenges of incorporating health equity in HTA.

DESCRIPTION: Although there is an ever-growing body of research on equity, including methods such as distributional cost-effectiveness analysis (DCEA), the incorporation of equity in HTA is inconsistent and is not well defined. How HTA agencies consider equity is a shifting landscape, and is one that will likely evolve in the coming years.

In this workshop, Ms. Cresswell will introduce the topic of equity in HTA, including how NICE was created to end the ‘post-code lottery’ and its work to date around equity (10 minutes). Dr. Jansen (methodologist perspective) will introduce the concept of DCEA as a quantitative method to quantify the health equity impact of a technology using an illustrative model-based example, and will highlight potential implementation challenges (10 minutes). Dr. Whittington (HTA perspective) will discuss the practical and ethical challenges of conducting a DCEA within a health technology assessment, and will describe other non-DCEA opportunities to incorporate equity within HTA (10 minutes). Dr. Gsteiger (industry perspective) will explore the application of equity considerations and DCEA in clinical development programs, and will discuss current challenges (including collecting the data needed for DCEA), opportunities, and prerequisites for a more widespread use in practice (10 minutes). The workshop will allocate 20 minutes for an interactive audience discussion, including question and answer sessions. Audience polling will be employed throughout to encourage active participation and engagement. The workshop will culminate by asking the audience how they think equity should be considered in HTA.