Resources Repository
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ReportPublication 2017Communicating Science Effectively: A Research Agenda
Science and technology are embedded in virtually every aspect of modern life. As a result, …
Science and technology are embedded in virtually every aspect of modern life. As a result, people face an increasing need to integrate information from science with their personal values and other considerations as they make important life decisions about medical care, the safety of foods, what to do about climate change, and many other issues. Communicating science effectively, however, is a complex task and an acquired skill. Moreover, the approaches to communicating science that will…
Priority Setting/Ethics | Health/Medicine | Education/Labor | Decision Psychology | Preferences/Values | Social Determinants | Climate/Environment | Culture/Society | Energy/Engineering | Science/Technology | North America -
Resource PackPublication, Teaching Resource 2018Resource Pack: Model Calibration and Validation
This resource pack, curated by the Center for Health Decision Science, provides broad exposure to …
This resource pack, curated by the Center for Health Decision Science, provides broad exposure to empirical calibration and validation methods for mathematical models used in health decision analysis. Included are a selection of overviews, guidelines, tutorials, and applications. Given the complexity of diseases and variation in data quality, there are invariably a number of parameters that are unobserved or cannot be estimated directly but can be inferred through the process of model calibration. Model calibration…
Calibration/Validation | Dynamic Transmission | Health/Medicine | Mathematical Models | State-Transition | Microsimulation | Dynamic Simulation -
ArticlePublication 2017Likelihood Approach for Calibration of Stochastic Epidemic Models
Stochastic transmission dynamic models are especially useful for studying the early emergence of novel pathogens …
Stochastic transmission dynamic models are especially useful for studying the early emergence of novel pathogens given the importance of chance events when the number of infectious individuals is small. However, methods for parameter estimation and prediction for these types of stochastic models remain limited. This paper describes a calibration and prediction framework for stochastic compartmental transmission models of epidemics. The proposed method applies a linear noise approximation to describe the size of the fluctuations, and…
Calibration/Validation | Dynamic Transmission | Health/Medicine | Dynamic Simulation | Infectious Diseases | Health Systems | Global -
ArticlePublication 2016Maternal-Related Deaths and Impoverishment among Adolescent Girls in India and Niger
This article, published in BMJ Open, examined the distribution of maternal deaths and impoverishment among …
This article, published in BMJ Open, examined the distribution of maternal deaths and impoverishment among adolescent girls across socioeconomic groups in Niger and India, which have the largest fertility rate, and number of maternal deaths, respectively. Results showed that in Niger and India, the poorer adolescents had a larger number of maternal deaths compared to the richer. Impoverishment occurred mostly among the richer adolescents in Niger and among the poorer adolescents in India. Increasing educational…
Priority Setting/Ethics | Health/Medicine | Education/Labor | Costing Methods | Health Outcomes | Mathematical Models | Cost-Effectiveness Analysis | Maternal/Reproductive Health | Social Determinants | Health Systems | Economics/Finance | Sub-Saharan Africa | Asia & Pacific -
ArticlePublication 2016Departures from Cost-Effectiveness Recommendations: Health System Constraints
Cost-effectiveness analysis assumes a single constraint, in the form of the budget constraint, whereas in reality …
Cost-effectiveness analysis assumes a single constraint, in the form of the budget constraint, whereas in reality decision makers may be faced with numerous other constraints. The objective of this article is to develop a typology of constraints that may act as barriers to implementation of cost-effectiveness recommendations. Six categories of constraints are considered: the design of the health system; costs of implementing change; system interactions between interventions; uncertainty in estimates of costs and benefits; weak governance;…
Priority Setting/Ethics | Health/Medicine | Education/Labor | Cost-Effectiveness Analysis | Health Systems | Policy/Regulation | Economics/Finance | Government/Law | Sub-Saharan Africa | Middle East & North Africa | Latin America & Caribbean | Asia & Pacific -
ReviewPublication 2016Decision Support for Infectious Disease Control
This report from RAND reviews decision-support tools, including models and nonmodeling approaches, that are relevant to …
This report from RAND reviews decision-support tools, including models and nonmodeling approaches, that are relevant to infectious disease prevention, detection, and response and aligns these tools with real-world policy questions that the tools can help address. This overview is designed to help modelers and other technical experts understand the questions that policymakers will raise and the decisions they must make. The report also presents policymakers with the capabilities and limitations of the different tools that may…
Dynamic Transmission | Military/Defense | Health/Medicine | Mathematical Models | State-Transition | Microsimulation | Dynamic Simulation | Infectious Diseases | Global Governance | Government/Law | Global -
ReviewPublication 2016Review: CEA for Maternal, Newborn, Child Health
This chapter summarizes the findings of a systematic search of the cost-effectiveness literature on interventions …
This chapter summarizes the findings of a systematic search of the cost-effectiveness literature on interventions to improve reproductive, maternal, newborn, and child health. Interventions for newborn health, treatment of febrile illness, immunization against preventable diseases, and micronutrient interventions remain among the most cost-effective and affordable. Other studies explore how to provide existing interventions using new platforms to increase outreach or decrease cost per person covered, or both. Interventions provided in the community may achieve both purposes to…
Priority Setting/Ethics | Health/Medicine | Education/Labor | Costing Methods | Cost-Effectiveness Analysis | Infectious Diseases | Maternal/Reproductive Health | Child/Nutrition | Health Systems | Global -
ArticlePublication 2015Broader Economic Impact of Vaccination: Reviewing and Appraising the Strength of Evidence
Economic evaluations of public health programs such as immunization often consider only direct health benefits and …
Economic evaluations of public health programs such as immunization often consider only direct health benefits and medical cost savings. Evidence linking immunization to important benefits in indicators such as childhood development, household behavior, and other macro-economic data are unclear. A conceptual framework of the pathways between immunization and these broader economic benefits was developed through expert consultation. The authors obtained articles from previous reviews, snowballing, and expert consultation, and associated them with one of the pathways and assessed them using modified Grading…
Priority Setting/Ethics | Health/Medicine | Education/Labor | Preferences/Values | Costing Methods | Evidence Synthesis | Benefit-Cost Analysis | Cost-Effectiveness Analysis | Infectious Diseases | Social Determinants | Economics/Finance -
GuidelinesPublication 2014Methods for Economic Evaluation Project
This report details the work of the Methods for Economic Evaluation Project (MEEP), which aims …
This report details the work of the Methods for Economic Evaluation Project (MEEP), which aims to promote a consistency in the methods used for economic evaluations. The report is targeted especially at low and middle-income countries (LMICs). The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is a major funder of health economic evaluations in LMICs, but there is substantial variation in the methods used and the quality of the analyses produced. The report drew on expertise from…
Priority Setting/Ethics | Health/Medicine | Education/Labor | Costing Methods | Benefit-Cost Analysis | Cost-Effectiveness Analysis | Climate/Environment | Global