Updated Evidence Standards Framework for digital health technologies and the launch of a new Office for Digital Health by NICE

On May 10, 2021, NICE announced the update of the evidence standards framework (ESF) for digital health technologies (DHTs).

The ESF for DHTs is made up of effectiveness standards and economic impact standards. The ESF aimed to make it easier for innovators and commissioners to understand what good levels of evidence for digital health technologies look like, providing standards for the evidence to demonstrate DHTs value in the UK health and social care system.

NICE updated the framework document with changes in response to an ESF user survey, which ran from October to December 2019. The following changes have been made:

• The names of the evidence tiers have been changed to avoid any confusion with CE marking categories: Tier 1 is now Tier A: system impact; Tier 2 is now Tier B: understanding and communicating; Tier 3a and 3b have been combined and are now Tier C: interventions;
• The evidence requirements for each evidence tier remain the same, but the presentation was changed;
• Table 1 was improved to make it easier to understand which DHTs fit into each functional classification.

Furthermore, NICE launched a new Office for Digital Health, a new team set up to accelerate delivering innovation to the health and care system faster, support the growing digital health sector, and closely monitor NICE's evolving methods and processes to ensure they fully accommodate new and emerging DHTs. They will coordinate NICE's digital health activities and strategic projects, lead digital health policy at NICE, and manage collaboration with external partners across government, industry, and academia.

The Office for Digital Health will work as a single point of contact for strategic partners, developers, and adopters to help to engage with NICE about DHTs assessment, and also triage digital companies' inquiries and appropriately direct them to the most suitable team within NICE.

The Office for Digital Health team can be contacted via email: digitalhealth@nice.org.uk

See the NICE news here, and the full evidence standards framework here

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