|
The Collège des Economistes de la Santé (the French Health
Economists association) wishes to promote the diffusion of health economics
studies in order to improve their impact on decision-making. To attain
this objective, the CES proposes to create and to develop a knowledge base
gathering published work in this field.
Moreover,
each study would be reviewed carefully according to an analytical framework
allowing for the publication of a specific commentary designed to stress
the main elements for the user.
The
project comprises two phases. In the first phase, studies dealing with
France would be recorded, analyzed, and lead to a commentary in French
and in English. In a second phase, the French base would serve as a prototype
for the other European countries. The final knowledge base would thus be
made of an European network of domestic base, with commentary in English
and in national languages.
The methodology
The
knowledge base will be built in the following way.
Each study will be referred according to standards of usual presentation
in the documentation data bases of Medline type. Moreover, it will be accompanied
by a Form structured as follows :
•
A summarized presentation of the study with the principal characteristics,
and stressing the main results;
•
A Formulary which will provide precise informations on : methodology, data
sources, the studied populations, the results, a systematic comparison
between studies, and all the particular characteristics of the work.
The field covered : geographic and thematic
Initially, the objective is to index and analyze all the studies concerning
France for the last fifteen years and the French-speaking countries. In
a second step, the objective is to cover progressively all major European
countries, with similar bases. The CES will mobilize its European counterparts
and its network of professional relationships to stimulate equivalent initiatives
in other countries. Complementary funding from EU could help such stimulation.
The critical advantage of such a project resides in the possibility to
make available information on local studies, which are not published in
international journals.
The topics retained for the choice of the studies to be indexed and analyzed:
•
medico-economic studies on health care services and devices (pharmaco-economy,
devices medical, practise medical....),
•
quality of life studies.
Future development of CODECS could include :
•
studies on the organization of the system of health services, in particular
from a comparative point of view,
•
conceptual work in health economics.
The studies census :
The studies likely to be part of the base result are mainly pre-reviewed
journal publications, but non-published material will be accepted if they
meet standard requirements of quality. A regular follow-up of these publications
will be carried out.
Criteria of inclusion and rejection.
The inclusion of a study and its analysis in base CODECS is done along
several steps.
1)
Among all the work listed in the consulted reviews, a first choice is carried
out to exclude studies outside the overall scope of the base.
2) The contents
of the study are examined to know if the principal criteria (to be determined)
are present and if the article can be reviewed.
3)
The referee carries out the summary and the technical notes then submit
it to the Steering committee in charge of the validation of the analyses
by the College. Once accepted, the summary is sent to the authors
for comments and correction of factual errors. Passed the phases
of validation, the reference, the summary and the technical notes of the
study are entered in the knowledge base.
The Formulary : construction and validation
The technical notes will be built on the basis of the grid of evaluation
used for the NHS base of the University of York (U-K) including about thirty
criteria. The technical notes model will be validated by the Steering committee
of CODECS and will constitute the framework of reference of all the analyses.
Principal headings of this Formulary are : bibliographical reference, medical
technology, disease, type of intervention, question at study, type of economic
study, studied population, site of study, source of data, modeling, literature
review, nature and synthesis of the analysis [CB, CE, CU], sensitivity
analysis, conclusion.
Research on the base :
A search engine suitable for CODECS base, will make it possible to carry
out search by key words on the principal criteria selected : author, disease,
technology, methodology, result...
Access to the base :
The CODECS base will be access free by the network world Internet (World
Wide Web) on the site created for this purpose and be also available on
CD-Rom and floppy disk.
The manual for CODECS base will be also available in print or on electronic
supports.
Back
to CODECS homepage
|
