Health technology assessment.

The developing role and use of diagnostic imaging continue to emerge as disease management paradigms are refined and clinical guidelines are employed more often. Health technology assessment, HTA (also known as health care technology assessment), is fundamentally a form of policy research. By formulating effective HTA, the short- and long-term effects of health care technology are studied in a systematic and multidisciplinary way. The fundamental aim of all HTA is to assist those individuals and organizations who stand to benefit from a new health technology (patients), those who will apply the technology (providers), and those who will pay for it (payers) to make better decisions about the technology they utilize by supplying information that is of a high scientific standard and population-based. Effective HTA is especially useful to health care providers, payers, professional groups in health care, manufacturers, political decision-makers and the general public or consumers of health care technology because it represents a process through which effective technology can be identified and ineffective technology can be understood in the context of its limitations. HTA is a multidisciplinary undertaking requiring combined expertise in clinical medicine, epidemiology, biostatistics, bioengineering, health economics, administration, psychology, sociology, ethics and legal science. Additionally, the experiences and opinions of health technology users and consumers of health care (especially patient advocacy groups) are needed to form an overall accurate understanding of the technology under review.