Impact of the 2003 to 2018 Population Salt Intake Reduction Program in England: A Modeling Study.

[Figure: see text].

Reaching consensus on reporting patient and public involvement (PPI) in research: methods and lessons learned from the development of reporting guidelines.

Introduction: Patient and public involvement (PPI) is inconsistently reported in health and social care research. Improving the quality of how PPI is reported is critical in developing a higher quality evidence base to gain a better insight into the methods and impact of PPI. This paper describes the methods used to develop and gain consensus on guidelines for reporting PPI in research studies (updated version of the Guidance for Reporting Patient and Public Involvement (GRIPP2)).

The cost-effectiveness of public health interventions examined by NICE from 2011 to 2016.

Background: A review of economic evaluations of public health interventions assessed by NICE between 2005 and 2010 found 85% were cost-effective. Owen et al. (The cost-effectiveness of public health interventions.

Topical capsaicin (high concentration) for chronic neuropathic pain in adults.

Background: This review is an update of 'Topical capsaicin (high concentration) for chronic neuropathic pain in adults' last updated in Issue 2, 2013. Topical creams with capsaicin are used to treat peripheral neuropathic pain. Following application to the skin, capsaicin causes enhanced sensitivity, followed by a period with reduced sensitivity and, after repeated applications, persistent desensitisation.

Adaptive Biomedical Innovation: Evolving Our Global System to Sustainably and Safely Bring New Medicines to Patients in Need.

The current system of biomedical innovation is unable to keep pace with scientific advancements. We propose to address this gap by reengineering innovation processes to accelerate reliable delivery of products that address unmet medical needs. Adaptive biomedical innovation (ABI) provides an integrative, strategic approach for process innovation.

Medicines Adaptive Pathways to Patients (MAPPs): A Story of International Collaboration Leading to Implementation.

After nearly a decade of discussion, analysis, and development, the Medicines Adaptive Pathways to Patients (MAPPs) initiative is beginning to see acceptance from regulators, industry, patients, and payers, with the first live pilot project initiated under the guidance of the European Medicines Agency in 2014. Although it is a significant achievement to see the first asset being placed into human trials under an adaptive pathway, there is much to be learned regarding the multinational and multi-stakeholder effort that has driven the growing acceptance of MAPPs as a methodology and concept, as well as the need for continued and increasing international collaboration to foster the wider adoption of MAPPs. Changes in available science and technology, as well as a number of challenges in the current system, outlined in this paper, are transforming approaches to medicines development and approval.

Multiple Criteria Decision Analysis for Health Care Decision Making--An Introduction: Report 1 of the ISPOR MCDA Emerging Good Practices Task Force.

Health care decisions are complex and involve confronting trade-offs between multiple, often conflicting, objectives. Using structured, explicit approaches to decisions involving multiple criteria can improve the quality of decision making and a set of techniques, known under the collective heading multiple criteria decision analysis (MCDA), are useful for this purpose. MCDA methods are widely used in other sectors, and recently there has been an increase in health care applications.

Facing the Adversity: the Role of Internal Assets on Well-Being in Adolescents with Special Needs.

Negative life events are one of the major threats to well-being. Some adolescents are more vulnerable, namely adolescents with special needs that face special challenges for growing up healthy and happy. Nevertheless, internal assets can act as protective factors.

NICE medical technologies guidance: aims for clinical practice.

NICE (the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) produces a range of advice and guidance on medical practice and technologies. NICE was established in 1999, and in 2009 set up its Medical Technologies Evaluation Programme. This assesses new devices in terms of whether their use would offer benefits to the patient and NHS at a lower cost compared with current practice, or increased benefits for equal cost.

Sharing the British National Health Service around the world: a self-interested perspective.

As the UK reiterates its commitment to protecting and growing its development aid budget amidst an adverse economic environment for the UK and Europe, we discuss the potential to use the country's National Health Service (NHS) model as a vehicle for promoting the country's economic as well as global health diplomacy and development priorities, through a coordinated cross-government plan of action. With the country's Prime Minister serving as a co-chair of the UN post-2015 development agenda panel,a this is a unique opportunity for the UK to put forward its health system architecture as a highly applicable and well-tested model for providing access to efficient and cost-effective care, with minimal financial hardship. Arguably, such a model tailored to the needs of specific countries could consequently lead to commercial opportunities for UK plc.

Evidence synthesis for decision making 7: a reviewer's checklist.

This checklist is for the review of evidence syntheses for treatment efficacy used in decision making based on either efficacy or cost-effectiveness. It is intended to be used for pairwise meta-analysis, indirect comparisons, and network meta-analysis, without distinction. It does not generate a quality rating and is not prescriptive.

Variations in primary care prescribing: lessons to be learnt for GP commissioners.

The quality and quantity of primary care prescribing represents a fundamental determinant of the clinical and cost-effectiveness of the UK NHS. The aim of this study was to determine the 'supply' factors that affect primary care prescribing, controlling for 'demand' factors and consider the implications for clinical commissioning groups (CCGs). A detailed regression analysis was undertaken of prescribing in six therapeutic areas to determine differences in prescribing across primary care trusts (PCTs) in England.

At the center of health care policy making: the use of health technology assessment at NICE.

The UK's National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE), a world leader in health technology assessment (HTA), sits at the interface of a policy environment where everything is urgent and consensus between policy makers and stakeholders is sometimes difficult to attain. The majority of stakeholder challenges to NICE's use of HTA concern the interpretation of evidence and the methodological rules applied by the appraisal committees. We discuss the most significant issues: choice of comparators; evidence synthesis and indirect comparison; parameter selection, especially for the valuation of quality of life; extrapolation beyond clinical trial data; and the level of the cost-effectiveness threshold.

What's happening at NICE?

From 1 April 2013, the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) will be re-established under the provisions of the Health and Social Care Act 2012. Although its name will change to the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, its acronym--NICE--has been written into the face of the Act. The new NICE will continue to provide the full range of guidance and other products with which the Institute has become associated.

Issues relating to selective reporting when including non-randomized studies in systematic reviews on the effects of healthcare interventions.

Background: Selective outcome and analysis reporting (SOR and SAR) occur when only a subset of outcomes measured and analyzed in a study is fully reported, and are an important source of potential bias.

Key Methodological Issues: We describe what is known about the prevalence and effects of SOR and SAR in both randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and non-randomized studies (NRS), and the effects of SOR and SAR on summary effect estimates and conclusions in systematic reviews of the effectiveness of healthcare interventions.

Guidance: Review authors should always suspect SOR and SAR in reviews that include NRS, assess primary studies for the risk of bias, and make reasonable attempts to retrieve study protocols or other documentation developed before study recruitment began.

Reducing ineffective practice: challenges in identifying low-value health care using Cochrane systematic reviews.

Objectives: Despite international agreement that stopping low value practices will increase efficiency, identifying them is difficult and controversial. Opponents of centralized lists of low value practices stress that the actual problem is inappropriate low value use, and better targeting and implementation of treatment thresholds is needed. Our objective was to use Cochrane Reviews to identify low value practices to support local disinvestment decisions.