Foundations course

‌Overview

This is a two-day foundations course designed for those wishing to develop an introductory understanding of the fundamental statistical concepts used in economic evaluation for Health Technology Assessment (HTA). The course includes a mixture of taught modules and practical exercises, where participants will learn the relevant statistical concepts and their estimation using the statistical software package Stata^®. Although Stata^® will be used as a vehicle to demonstrate a variety of statistical concepts in HTA, no prior knowledge of Stata^® will be required to understand these demonstrations. 

Teaching methods‌‌

The course includes a mixture of presentations from members of the Faculty, together with computer-based exercises using Stata^®. The course will take place in a computer laboratory within the University of York campus and each participant will have access to a PC with Stata^® version 14 installed. Stata^® code (do-files) required to complete the exercises will be provided and all exercises will be supported by Faculty and a group of tutors. Participants are expected to have a basic familiarity with the concepts of cost-effectiveness analysis. 

Objectives 

By the end of the course, participants will be able to: 

• understand the key statistical concepts relevant to economic evaluation for HTA.
• manipulate existing evidence to estimate statistical parameters, relevant to economic evaluation.
• produce descriptive statistics, tabulation, and correlations from patient-level data using Stata^® to derive: (i) inputs for models and (ii) CEA results. 
• understand good practice in the reporting of cost-effectiveness results to decision makers and recognise the analytical issues involved when dealing with patient-level data.
• appreciate the potential for using a regression approach to derive parameter estimates to populate a cost-effectiveness model while controlling for patient characteristics. 

Outline programme

Please note that the exact programme is subject to change although the material covered will remain largely the same. 

Day One (10am start)

• Introduction and Policy Context
• Course Introduction to Stata^® (Lecture and Practical)
• Foundations in Statistics for Economic Evaluation (Lecture and Practical) - key quantities and how they are derived
• Exploiting Available Evidence (Lecture and Practical)
• Evening Social Event 

Day Two

• Analytical Approaches involving Patient-Level Data (Lecture and Practical)
• Multivariable Regression for Economic Evaluation (Lecture and Practical)
• Advanced Statistical Issues  – this lecture looks at a series of case studies to make participants aware of statistical issues beyond the scope of the foundations course
• Course Ends (5pm)

Fees

VAT is not payable

• Fees are fully inclusive of tuition
• Lunch
• Course dinner
• Course materials
• Do not include accommodation

Regression methods course

Overview

This course is intended for people currently undertaking health economic evaluations within the pharmaceutical and medical device industries, consultancy, academia or the health service who wish to learn how to use regression methods to analyse individual patient-level cost, effect and cost-effectiveness data. The course includes a mixture of taught modules and practical exercises. Regression methods is a three-day course focusing on the use of regression analysis methods for health economic evaluation of individual patient- level cost, effect and cost-effectiveness data. This course is run by the Centre for Health Economics at the University of York.

Teaching methods

Exercises will be based on Stata and some prior experience of this software would be an advantage. The course includes a mixture of presentations from members of the Faculty, together with computer-based exercises using Stata^®. The course will take place in a computer laboratory within the University of York campus and each participant will have access to a PC with Stata^® version 14 installed. Stata^® code (do-files) required to complete the exercises will be provided and all exercises will be supported by Faculty and a group of tutors. Previous experience of the Stata^® software package would be an advantage when attending this course.

Objectives

By the end of the course, participants will be able to:

• know how to apply a range of regression methods suitable for health economic evaluation
• report and present the output from such analyses to policy makers
• have experience in applying regression methods for cost-effectiveness analysis in Stata

Outline programme

Please note that the exact programme is subject to change although the material covered will remain largely the same.

This course will start with simple trial data set and add greater sophistication as building blocks over three days. Topics covered by the course include analysing different types of outcomes, dealing with skewed data, adding individual-level covariates, using seemingly unrelated regression to account for correlation between costs and effects at patient-level, conducting survival analysis, using regression
analysis to populate decision analytic models, and presenting the results of the regression-based cost-effectiveness analysis.

Three-day course

Day one - 9.00am to 6.00pm

• Economic evaluation for policy decisions
• Analytical approaches to health economic evaluation using individual patient-level data
• How to specify and fit regression models for cost-effectiveness analysis
• Ordinary Least Squares (OLS)
• Seemingly unrelated regression
• Evening social event: drinks reception

Day two - 9.00am to 5.30pm

• Costs, QALYs, net benefits and other outcomes
• Issues with applying OLS to cost-effectiveness analysis
• Alternatives to OLS:
  • transformation
  • Generalised Linear Models (GLM)
  • two-part models
• Observational data and selection bias
• Propensity scores and matching
• Evening social event: dinner

Day three - 9.00am to 3.45pm

• Choosing the appropriate analysis for your dataset
• Survival analysis for time to event data
• Regression analysis to inform decision models

Fees

VAT is not payable

• Fees are fully inclusive of tuition
• Lunch
• Course dinner
• Course materials
• Do not include accommodation

Faculty

Faculty

Susan Griffin

Susan Griffin, PhD, Centre for Health Economics, University of York. Susan is a Senior Research Fellow based in the team for Economic Evaluation and Health Technology Assessment. Her research interests include the use of decision-analytic models in cost-effectiveness analysis, value of information analysis and the application of methods for economic evaluation in the field of public health. Susan has worked on economic evaluations in the fields of cardiovascular disease, HIV/AIDS, cancer and mental health.

Andrea Manca (course leader)

Andrea Manca, PhD, Centre for Health Economics, University of York. Andrea is Professor of Health Economics based in the Team for Economic Evaluation and Health Technology Assessment. His research interests include the application of statistical methods for the analysis of cost-effectiveness and health outcomes data, as well as the use of evidence synthesis techniques in economic evaluation to support health care decision making. Andrea has worked in economic evaluations of health technologies in several clinical areas. 

Nigel Rice  

Nigel Rice, PhD, Centre for Health Economics, University of York. Nigel is Professor of Health Economics. His research interests include the application of econometric methods to the analysis of micro-data on health and health care. Recent work in this area include: estimating dynamic panel data models of the determinants of health with reference to the role of income and education; examining health-related attrition bias in panel survey data; investigating the extent of reporting bias and heterogeneity in measures of self-assessed health.

Mark Sculpher

Mark Sculpher, PhD, Centre for Health Economics, University of York. Mark is Professor of Health Economics and leads the Team for Economic Evaluation and Health Technology Assessment. He has worked on numerous applied economic evaluations including interventions in heart disease, cancer, HIV and respiratory disease. His methodological interests are handling uncertainty and decision analytical modelling. In addition to the presenters below, tutors from CHE will be involved in all exercises to ensure that there will be approximately one faculty member for every four participants.

Registration

Registration

Before you register on these workshops please ensure you have secured the appropriate funding from your organisation, and (if applicable) that you allow yourself plenty of time to apply for any visas you may require to enter the UK, as you may experience some delay in getting these processed.

Please register via one of the following payment options:

• credit/debit card for immediate payment via the University of York online payment store
• an invoice can be issued using this form Invoice registration

Fees

Fees are fully inclusive of tuition, lunch, course dinner and course materials, but do not include accommodation. VAT is not payable.

Places on all workshops are available to book right up until Friday 9th March 2018, although it is advisable to book early to avoid disappointment.

Cancellations and alterations

A full refund of course fees (less 10% administrative charge) will be made for cancellations received in writing at least one month prior to the workshop. Substitutes can be made but please email new delegates details when known to che-statmeth@york.ac.uk. Cancellations made less than one month prior to the workshops are non-refundable/non-changeable.

In the unlikely event that, due to unforeseen circumstances, the course has to be cancelled by the University of York, our liability is limited to refund of workshop fees. We recommend delegates have adequate insurance cover to claim any travel or personal expenses.

Accommodation

You are responsible for arranging your own accommodation.  Unfortunately, campus accommodation is not available over the Easter break.  Some rooms may become available - the University Conference Office can provide updated information.  There are many hotels and guest houses locally (Fulford and Heslington are the closest areas) and some of these hotels can be viewed on the following web-sites:

http://www.expedia.co.uk/Fulford-Hotels.d602274.Travel-Guide-Hotels

http://www.visityork.org/