Throughout the world, there is an increasing emphasis on the use of Health Technology Assessment (HTA) to determine value for money when adopting medical technology. The question is: How can we embed HTA into supply-side thinking as well as on the demand side?

In MATCH (Multidisciplinary Assessment of Technology Centre for Healthcare), we work with demand-side organisations such as the NHS Purchasing and Supply Agency (PaSA) and its Centre for Evidence-based Purchasing (CEP) to develop decision-support methods and tools, as well as with the NHS National Innovation Centre (NIC).

On the supply side of the fence, embedding HTA into the product development cycle is also a challenge, especially since the practicality of a new invention, and end-user attitudes to it, are often unclear until a solution has been engineered.  Because a great deal is based on belief rather than evidence at the start, the MATCH team works with a range of companies to develop an integrated suit of methods that connect between the worlds of ‘based on belief’ and ‘based on evidence.’  This involves producing guidelines, developing methods, and providing integrated HTA tools for business processes – for those producing medical technology and those who take it up and use it.