In late April, NHS Accelerated Access Collaborative introduced the Health Technology Navigation Pathway Tool to help innovators adopt new technologies into the NHS. The Tool breaks the innovation journey down into 25 steps, themed around the five key phases of the product lifecycle, from creation to commissioning and adoption. For each step, the schematic flowchart outlines key organizations to engage with, regulatory insights, best practice approaches, policies, guidelines, to-do lists, and required outputs.

We are happy to announce a further expansion of our HEOR Department with Agni Baka, a health economist from the Netherlands. Agni holds a Master's Degree in Health Economics from the Erasmus University Rotterdam (2013), and she is a PhD Candidate (2023) from the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in the Netherlands. Agni has six years of experience in the field of health economics and European health technology assessment (HTA). Agni combines expertise from both consultancy (Mapi Group in the Netherlands) and academia (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam). Agni was involved in health economic research of non-pharmaceutical health interventions in the Netherlands and had a number of health economic publications in peer-reviewed journals (Applied Health Economics and Health Policy, Behavioral Sleep Medicine, International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity).

In April 2023, the Finnish Coordinating Center for Health Technology Assessment (FinCCHTA) released three health technology assessments in the field of eHealth, including the assessment of Thermidas thermal imaging system as well as two comparison reports of Digi-HTA with NorDEC and DiGAV frameworks.

The French National Authority for Health (HAS) released new recommendations about add-on reimbursement of medical devices and medical aids from the meetings of the National Commission for Evaluation of Medical Devices and Health Technologies (CNEDiMTS) in April 2023. Twenty-three recommendations were published in relation to the registration, modification of registration conditions, and renewal of registration for devices in the List of reimbursable products and services (LPPR). Opinions concern cardiovascular, orthopedic, nephrology and urology, and surgical devices, as well as medical aids.

In April 2023, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) published seven new Interventional Procedure Guidance (concerned Daytime intraoral neuromuscular electrical tongue stimulation, endoscopic ultrasound-guided biliary drainage, maximal cytoreductive surgery in ovarian cancer, percutaneous thoracic duct embolization, radiofrequency ablation for spinal metastases, high-intensity focused ultrasound for prostate cancer), one new Medical Technologies Guidance (AposHealth for knee osteoarthritis), and one Medtech Innovation Briefing (Fasciotens for abdominal wall closure). Also, three clinical guidelines were updated.

On April 20, 2023, the Dutch Healthcare Authority (NZa) published the first release of the DRG package for 2024 (RZ24a). Twenty-three new procedure codes, nine new supplementary payments, and thirteen new DRGs will be implemented across gynecology, pulmonary, extracorporeal treatments, and other technology groups.

On April 14, 2023, a repository of innovative acts outside the nomenclature of biology and anatomopathology (RIHN) and a Supplementary list of IVD tests were published. Minor changes were introduced in the 2023 RIHN list.

On April 19, 2023, the Italian Ministry of Health announced that the State-Regions Conference approved the national tariffs for outpatient specialist care and prosthetic care. These tariffs will be applied to Annexes 4 (outpatient specialist care) and 5 (prosthetic care) of the Essential Levels of Care (LEA) document from 2017. New tariffs for outpatient specialist care will enter into force in January 2024, and the tariffs for prosthetic care will enter into force on April 1, 2024.

In April 2023, Swedish Medical Technologies Product (MTP) Council recommended that Magtrace and Sentimag be used for locating sentinel lymph nodes in breast cancer. The products were evaluated within the Orderly introduction framework, in which all Swedish regions collaborate to manage the national introduction of innovative medical technologies.

In the middle of April 2023, the French National Authority for Health (HAS) published a decision modifying its internal regulations establishing the “Commission for the Evaluation of Diagnostic, Prognostic, and Predictive Technologies (CEDiag)”. This Commission is responsible for preparing the opinions and decisions of the HAS relating to the evaluation of health technologies for diagnostic, prognostic or predictive purposes.

In April 2023, the Clinical Coding and Schedule Development (CCSD) working group, which develops and maintains procedural and diagnostics nomenclatures for private payers in England, published Bulletins 189 and 085 with changes to be implemented no later than June 15, 2023. Eighteen new procedure codes (concerning cardiovascular, endocrine, endoscopy, gastrointestinal, interventional radiology, neuromodulation, peripheral vascular, robotic surgery, men's health, and general surgery fields) and eight new diagnostic codes were introduced.

MTRC shares the most relevant and impactful publications in the field of market access and HEOR for medical technologies in Europe through its Publications Digest. In a recent publication, Tarricone et al. reviewed the new EU regulations for medical devices and health technology assessment, highlighting their potential benefits in increasing clinical evidence quality and reducing fragmentation in the EU market access process. The authors also provided recommendations for the structure of a potential new Accelerated Access Pathway for innovative, high-risk (in particular implantable and class III) medical devices which would fit the pan-European context and safely accelerate patient access.