Economic Development of Countries and Health Technology Assessment (HTA) in Healthcare Decision Making.

The research indicated the relationship between the formal criteria of Health Technology Assessment (HTA) availability and the economic development of countries considering HTA to be an indicator for the effectiveness of the healthcare management process. HTA is at the very end of the evidence data generation. It makes possible forecasting medical, economic and social outcomes of healthcare management decisions and is the base for rational use of healthcare resources. Effective allocation of healthcare funds leads to an increase in human capital and economic development opportunities followed by the overall healthcare expenditures growth. The number of countries using HTA increases with the growth of per capita GDP, reaching a maximum in the countries with 40-50 thousand USD GDP per capita value range and decreases with further growth of this indicator. The low level of economic development, characterized by a low per capita GDP, makes it difficult to implement HTA due to strict regulations aimed at expenditures decrease and preventing using effectiveness criteria for health management assessment. Nevertheless, a significant number of low-income countries (below 10 thousand USD) per capita GDP are striving to improve the efficiency of health management and are at different stages of the HTA creation and implementation into healthcare systems. The opposite countries with high (above 50 thousand USD) per capita GDP are mostly tax haven countries (offshore zones) and as a rule these indicators are not linked with the real economic and industrial development. These countries do not use HTA for expert support of healthcare management decisions. Regional international cooperation increases the possibility of creating and using HTA in both low and high per capita GDP countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]