Welcome to Economic Evaluation in Healthcare 101, a short course for those interested in understanding why and how to evaluation the economics behind today’s health care systems.
Healthcare is one of the most dynamic, high-stakes industries in the world. Every day, leaders must decide which therapies to fund, which technologies to adopt, and how to allocate limited resources across competing priorities. The challenge? Demand is limitless—but budgets are not.
This is where economic evaluation in healthcare becomes not just useful—but essential.
Economic evaluation sits at the intersection of medicine, policy, and finance. It provides the structured, evidence-based framework that helps decision-makers answer one of the most important questions in healthcare:
Are we getting the greatest possible health benefit from every dollar spent?
In this course, you will gain a powerful toolkit used by health economists, policymakers, pharmaceutical leaders, payers, and health technology assessment (HTA) agencies worldwide. You will learn how to rigorously evaluate interventions using cost-minimization, cost-effectiveness, cost-utility, and cost-benefit analyses—while understanding when and why each method matters.
We will go beyond theory. You’ll explore how to measure costs (direct, indirect, and intangible), quantify outcomes using QALYs and DALYs, and build decision-analytic models such as decision trees and Markov models. You’ll learn how to calculate and interpret ICERs, navigate the cost-effectiveness plane, apply willingness-to-pay thresholds, and translate results into real-world policy and reimbursement decisions.
Importantly, this course connects economic evaluation to real-world healthcare systems. You’ll examine how organizations like NICE, CADTH, and ICER use evidence to inform national and regional decisions. You’ll grapple with ethical and equity trade-offs—efficiency versus fairness—and explore how emerging tools like big data, machine learning, personalized medicine, and digital health are reshaping economic assessment.
By the end of this course, you will not only understand the technical foundations of economic evaluation—you will be able to apply them strategically. Whether you work in policy, industry, academia, or clinical leadership, you will be equipped to:
- Critically evaluate economic studies
- Design and interpret cost-effectiveness analyses
- Inform resource allocation decisions
- Communicate value to stakeholders
- Lead evidence-based decision-making in complex environments
Economic evaluation is more than a methodological discipline—it is a leadership skill in modern healthcare.
If you want to understand how health systems decide what gets funded, why some therapies gain access while others do not, and how to influence those decisions with credible evidence—this course will give you that edge.
The 10 modules included in this course include:
1. Introduction to Economic Evaluation in Healthcare
- What is Economic Evaluation?
- Importance of Economic Evaluation in Healthcare Decision-Making
- Key Principles: Scarcity, Opportunity Cost, and Efficiency
2. Types of Economic Evaluations in Healthcare
- Budget Impact Analysis (BIA) – Assessing affordability
- Cost-Minimization Analysis (CMA) – When and how to use it
- Cost-Effectiveness Analysis (CEA) – Comparing interventions based on cost per unit of health outcome
- Cost-Utility Analysis (CUA) – Quality-Adjusted Life Years (QALYs) and Disability-Adjusted Life Years (DALYs)
- Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA) – Monetizing health outcomes
3. Measuring Costs in Healthcare
- Direct Costs – Medical costs (hospitalization, treatment, drugs)
- Indirect Costs – Productivity losses, absenteeism, informal caregiving
- Intangible Costs – Pain, suffering, and psychological impact
- Approaches to Costing: Micro-costing vs. Gross-costing
- Clinical Outcomes (e.g., mortality, morbidity)
- Health-Related Quality of Life (HRQoL)
- QALYs and DALYs – Calculation and Interpretation
- Preference-Based Measures (EQ-5D, SF-6D, HUI)
5. Decision Analytic Modeling in Economic Evaluation
- Introduction to Decision Trees
- Markov Models in Healthcare
- Handling Uncertainty: Sensitivity Analysis (One-Way, Probabilistic)
- Discounting Future Costs and Benefits
6. Data Sources for Economic Evaluation in Healthcare
- Clinical Trials vs. Real-World Data
- Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses
- Administrative and Claims Databases
- Challenges in Data Collection and Quality
7. Interpreting and Applying Economic Evaluation Results in Healthcare
- The Cost-Effectiveness Plane
- Incremental Cost-Effectiveness Ratio (ICER)
- Willingness-to-Pay (WTP) Thresholds
- Net Health Benefit (NHB)
- How Policymakers Use Economic Evaluation in Resource Allocation
8. Economic Evaluation in Health Technology Assessment (HTA)
- Role of HTA in Decision-Making
- Case Studies: NICE (UK), CADTH (Canada), ICER (US)
- Global Perspectives on Economic Evaluation and HTA
9. Ethical and Equity Considerations in Economic Evaluation
- Equity vs. Efficiency Trade-Offs
- Distributional Cost-Effectiveness Analysis (DCEA)
- Ethical Implications of QALYs and DALYs
10. Future Trends in Economic Evaluation in Healthcare
- Big Data and Machine Learning in Economic Evaluation
- Personalized Medicine and Economic Evaluation
- Digital Health Technologies and Economic Assessment
