Economic evaluations alongside trials and real-world evidence

On Friday, 20 March, we welcomed over 50 attendees to the Queen Mary campus for a joint conference between the UCL Health Economics Policy Lab and DeNPRU-QM. The conference brought together researchers from across England with an interest in how health economics can be used alongside trials to support evaluation and generate insights for implementation. To recognise the partnership with DeNPRU-QM, the agenda had a special focus on dementia and neurodegenerative diseases.

Professor Richard Grieve gave the first keynote, presenting clear and informative arguments about why causal inference is so important in economic evaluations. In the morning and afternoon parallel sessions, presentations covered topics from Parkinson’s disease to cancer care and highlighted the importance of real-world data throughout the diagnostic pathway.

Professor Claudia Cooper and Dr Harriet Demnitz-King from DeNRPU-QM gave the closing keynote, using two trials led by Claudia as case studies: APPLE-Tree (a programme supporting lifestyle and behavioural changes to reduce dementia risk) and NIDUS (a psychosocial intervention designed to support people with dementia to live well at home for longer). They discussed the challenges of conducting health economic evaluations within dementia prevention and care research, as well as opportunities for future work in this area.

To find out more about the conference, or to read the full abstracts, please visit the website.

Professor Rachael Hunter speaking
Professor Rachael Hunter welcoming attendees to the conference
Dr Matthew Franklin’s parallel session on causal economic evaluation using real-world data
Professor Claudia Cooper giving the afternoon keynote