ISSUE:

What are the major challenges facing HTA agencies in lower-income countries (LICs) in Eastern Europe and Central Asia (EE&CA) in providing access to new medicines and what next steps should be taken to improve their efficiency and effectiveness in doing this?

OVERVIEW:

Compared to the high-income countries with well-developed HTA processes for evaluating the value of new medicines, LICs face some obvious challenges in terms of limited resources, experience, and available expertise. Information about the clinical and economic value of new medicines is transferable—to some degree—across countries. Efficient HTA in LICs needs to leverage optimally this information. How best to go about that?

The moderator and three panelists were speakers in a recent conference in April in Kazakhstan on continuous quality improvement in HTA in LICs in EE&CA. Coming from different perspectives and experiences, they each presented their particular point of view or spoke to a specific HTA issue, but any debate was limited and indirect. This session will challenge each of them to identify what they see as the three major challenges and three most productive next steps. The audience will be polled with regard to ranking these challenges and next steps at the beginning of the session. And then after each of the panelists has made the case for their priorities, the audience will be polled again at the end of the session.

The moderator Prof. Garrison will set the stage for the debate with 10 minutes of opening remarks on HTA trends globally. After a quick baseline poll, each of the panelists—Dr. Almadiyeva (Kazakhstan); Dr. Landa (Poland); and Dr. Kalo (Hungary)—will have 10 minutes to present their case—vis-à-vis the other speakers, whose positions they will know in advance. This will leave about 15 minutes for further debate, audience Q&A, and the final poll.