Mapping of Health Technology Assessment (HTA) teaching and training initiatives: Landscape for evidence-based policy decisions in India

Rinshu Dwivedi; Ramesh Athe; Sanghamitra Pati; Krushna C Sahoo; Debdutta Bhattacharya

doi:10.4103/jfmpc.jfmpc_920_20

Mapping of Health Technology Assessment (HTA) teaching and training initiatives: Landscape for evidence-based policy decisions in India

J Family Med Prim Care. 2020 Nov 30;9(11):5458-5467. doi: 10.4103/jfmpc.jfmpc_920_20. eCollection 2020 Nov.

Authors

Rinshu Dwivedi¹, Ramesh Athe², Sanghamitra Pati³, Krushna C Sahoo⁴, Debdutta Bhattacharya⁵

Affiliations

¹ Department of Science and Humanities, Indian Institute of Information Technology, Tiruchirappalli, Tamil Nadu, India.
² Department of Humanities and Science, Indian Institute of Information Technology, Dharwad, Karnataka, India.
³ Director and Scientist-G, ICMR-Regional Medical Research Centre, Chandrasekharpur-Bhubaneswar, Orissa, India.
⁴ Consultant (Public Health), Health Technology Assessment in India, ICMR-Regional Medical Research Centre, Chandrasekharpur-Bhubaneswar, Odisha, India.
⁵ Scientist-D, ICMR-Regional Medical Research Centre, Chandrasekharpur-Bhubaneswar, Orissa, India.

Abstract

Demographic transitions accompanied with epidemiological shifts are affecting many countries around the globe. These apprehensions have raised the concern for constructing and sustaining healthcare systems especially among resource-constrained low- and middle-income-countries (LMICs) such as India. Introducing Health-Technology-Assessment (HTA) in the educational initiatives could support planners and policy-makers in formulating evidence-based-decision-making along with tackling inequalities/inefficiencies and promoting cost-effectiveness in resource allocation. A mapping exercise has been undertaken for examining the feasibility and implementation of HTA curriculum in the existing courses in India. To gain best possible insight on HTA curriculum, a situational analysis was conducted using systematic search strategy through search engines such as Google, Google Scholar, ProQuest and PubMed. Currently, seventy-one institutes in India are offering one or more courses through regular mode at undergraduate/postgraduate/diploma-certificate/doctorate-level pertaining to Medical-technology (MT), Biostatistics (BS), and Health-economics (HE). MT was offered in 37 institutes (52.12%), followed by BS in 23 (32.39%), and HE in nine (12.67%). Only two institutes (2.81%) are offering certificate-courses on HTA, mainly confined in virtual modules. This review reveals noticeable gaps in the existing curriculum in India and necessitates a novel academic initiative by introducing HTA in a full-fledged manner. Reforms in the research and educational initiatives need to be brought for promoting awareness regarding HTA. The application of domain needs to be widened from the field of health-policy formulators to research and teaching. This should be further strengthened with the strong academic collaborations to generate replicable findings, address challenges, and offer solutions for existing threats to HTA.

Keywords: Health technology assessment; India; mapping; public-health; teaching.

Publication types

Review