The Dutch Healthcare Authority advises to reward health care providers in specialist medical care on the basis of the health benefits for the patient.

In the draft guideline for management of urinary incontinence and pelvic organ prolapse NICE recommended to offer a full range of non-surgical options to women with stress urinary incontinence or pelvic organ prolapse before any operations.

MTRC is offering an opportunity to access 2019 market access retainer scheme using the discounted price during November-December 2018. The benefit to our clients of entering into this scheme is the forward planning of market access-related project activities and more effective budget management.

The Health Data Agency published new DRG tariffs for hospital and outpatient care in the somatic and psychiatric area for 2019.

Adding the MammaPrint® to the standard risk assessment in patients with early-stage breast cancer has not demonstrated health gains compared to the current way of determining whether a patient needs chemotherapy. Dutch National Health Care Institute has concluded that the test is not eligible for reimbursement from the basic insurance package.

In October of 2018, the Norwegian Institute of Public Health (NIPH) has published a single technology assessment regarding the external ultrasound stimulation - Exogen™ in the treatment of femoral or tibial non-union. The objective of the assessment was to evaluate the efficacy, safety and health economic documentation for EXOGEN™ compared to surgical treatment for the management of patients with non-union of a fracture. The results have shown that the present documentation does not give evidence to assess the clinical or cost-effectiveness of EXOGEN™ for the treatment of non-union fractures compared to surgery.

In October, Danish Health Authority published new codes for the Health Care Classification System, including one surgical, nine medical codes and two codes for ultrasound diagnostics. These codes are used to classify procedures in the Danish DRG system.

On the 1st of October of 2018, the Russian Ministry of Health has released the Order № 665n about the extension of the list of transplantation objects with inclusion of hematopoietic stem cells.

Two mini-method assessments regarding the magnetic technology (Magseed) for labeling non-palpable breast lesions and robotic-assisted minimally invasive harvesting of muscle patches for reconstructive surgery were initiated in Norway this October of 2018. All finalized mini-method assessments are published in the National Database for Mini-HTA.

On October 26, 2018, the French High Authority for Health (HAS) has announced that the composition of the National Commission for the Evaluation of Medical Devices and Health Technologies (CNEDiMTS) has been renewed.

On October 26, 2018, the European Network for Health Technology Assessment has published the final report of femtosecond laser-assisted cataract surgery (FLACS) for the treatment of age-related cataract. The authors of this report are a group of experts from the Italian region of Emilia Romagna, together with Health Austria (Gesundheit Österreich, GÖG).

In September, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) published two new interventional procedure guidance for transurethral water jet ablation for lower urinary tract symptoms caused by benign prostatic hyperplasia and intravesical microwave hyperthermia and chemotherapy for non-muscle-invasive bladder cancer, one medical technologies guidance for neuropad for detecting preclinical diabetic peripheral neuropathy and two new medtech innovation.