Princeton, NJ, USA – As consumers, we are becoming experts at scrutinizing the reviews our peers write about products we are thinking of buying. We ask ourselves if the comments written in the review truly fit the product, are the comments promotional or too negative, or simply unrelated to the product itself. Health care decision makers are starting to do this with modeling studies.
They are asking themselves, “Where is this information coming from? Are the results realistic? Are they relevant to my decision?” Dr. Jaime Caro, co-author on the paper, “
Model Transparency and Validation: A Report of the ISPOR-SMDM Modeling Good Research Practices Task Force Working Group-7,” states, “For decision makers to trust the results of models, these must be shown to be valid in the sense of being sufficiently accurate and relevant. This subgroup of the ISPOR-SMDM Modeling Task Force detailed the steps required to ensure the validity of models and grappled with the difficult balance between transparency and protection of intellectual property, proposing a compromise that should provide for full scientific review of models.” This paper provides guidance for health care researchers to ensure that their models are both transparent and valid.
This paper is one of the seven papers in the series on modeling study best practices and is jointly published in
Value in Health, the official journal of the International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research (ISPOR), and
Medical Decision Making, the official journal of the Society for Medical Decision Making (SMDM).
Value in Health (ISSN 1098-3015) publishes papers, concepts, and ideas that advance the field of pharmacoeconomics and outcomes research as well as policy papers to help health care leaders make evidence-based decisions. The journal is published bi-monthly and has over 8,000 subscribers (clinicians, decision makers, and researchers worldwide).
International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research (ISPOR) is a nonprofit, international, educational and scientific organization that strives to increase the efficiency, effectiveness, and fairness of health care resource use to improve health.
For more information:
www.ispor.org