24 de setembre 2015

The modeling approach to health decisions

Applying Modeling to Improve Health and Economic Policy Decisions in the Americas: The Case of Noncommunicable Diseases

On the role of modeling in health, this OECD report says:
In the health sector, the purpose of modeling is to structure evidence on clinical and economic outcomes in a form that can inform decisions about clinical practices and health care resource allocations. Models synthesize evidence on health consequences and costs from many different sources, including clinical trials, observational studies, insurance claim databases, case registries, public health statistics, and preference surveys. A model’s logical, mathematical framework permits the integration of facts and values and links these data to outcomes that are of interest to health care decisionmakers
I agree. The report shows some examples of aggregated modeling without panel microdata. If you compare this approach with David Eddy one, Archimedes models, it is exactly the opposite. And my opinion is in favour of Archimedes, as you can check in my previous posts. The most useful approach to modeling is the one that allows improve decisions at micro level, physician and patient.

PS. An innovative approach with practical implications in SSIBE, Palamós.

 Bonnard exhibition in Madrid.