In early December 2020, one more reimbursable health app was introduced on the Directory of digital health applications (DiGAs) at the Federal Office for Drugs and Medical Devices (BfArM). These applications can be prescribed by physicians and psychotherapists and will be reimbursed by health insurers.

In November 2020, the Clinical Coding and Schedule Development (CCSD) group, which develops and maintains procedural and diagnostics nomenclature for private payers in England, has published Bulletins 0173 and 0070 with changes to be implemented not later than February 01, 2021. Three new procedure codes were introduced, related to robotic laparoscopy in gynecology, brachytherapy in prostate tumor, and autologous bone marrow aspirate concentrate (BMAC) for osteochondral defects of the knee. Also, four codes for diagnostic tests were added.

During presentation at the conference "Medicine and quality - 2020", Deputy Minister of Health of the Russian Federation, Evgeniy Kamkin, released information about the volume of High-End Medical Care in 2020. The volume of High-End Medical Care in the first ten months of 2020 decreased by an average of 10% compared to the same period in 2019. The reason for the decrease in the provision of High-End Medical Care was the re-profiling of medical organizations for the fight against COVID-19.

In November 2020, Stockholm Region issued a preliminary version of the prospective report for the management of health care up to 2040. The report raised the need for new ways of organizing health care in the Stockholm Region and outlined the increase of standardization and alignment trend, emerge of collaborative governance models, the increase of care structure complexity, etc.

The Department of Health and Social Care announced its new national testing strategy, which aimed to scale up testing programs for COVID-19. To reach the aim, the evaluation process of virus detection and antibody detection tests to place the test kit on the market in the UK was initiated. The call for proposals to supply antibody detection tests has been closed, but proposals for virus detection tests are still ongoing.

On December 03, 2020, the Swedish Dental and Pharmaceutical Benefits Agency (TLV) published a report on its activities in health economic evaluations of medical technologies in 2020. The significant change is that since 2020 TLV has a permanent assignment to carry out horizon scanning and health economic evaluations of medical technology products as a part of the national orderly introduction framework.

On November 27, 2020, the National Committee for the evaluation of medical devices and health technologies (CNEDiMTS) at the French National Authority for Health (HAS) released a recommendation about the registration of flash self-monitoring glucose system FREESTYLE LIBRE 2 in the LPPR list.

In November 2020, NHS Accelerated Access Collaborative published their plans for further introducing MedTech Funding Mandate after the COVID-19 outbreak. The MedTech Funding Mandate policy and the consultation outcome report are planning to be published this winter to support its launch in April 2021.

The HTA body of the Tuscany Regional Healthcare issues two types of documents: HTA forms and motivational forms. With a regional decree 19274 of November 24, Tuscany Regional Healthcare has published assessments of twelve medical devices of various therapeutic areas. See the list of evaluated devices in the post from MTRC.

In November 2020, NHS Accelerated Access Collaborative updated the Rapid Uptake Products program for 2020/21. Three innovations from the 2019/20 program will continue through 2020/21, and four new products were added.

On November 3, 2020, the Dutch Healthcare Authority (NZa) published the critical features of the first release of the DRG package for the 2022 (RZ22a). Sixteen new procedure codes and three new DRG groups will be implemented.

The ultimate step in establishing reimbursement is achieved by making reimbursement applications to authorities. MTRC provides support with the development of reimbursement applications for a novel procedure code, change of diagnosis-related groups (DRGs) and establishing other payment mechanisms in the Nordic region and Russia.