Alexandria, VA – June 7, 2023 – The Innovation and Value Initiative (IVI), a non-profit research organization committed to advancing the science, practice, and use of health technology assessment in healthcare, in partnership with AcademyHealth, released a joint report, “A Research Framework to Understand the Full Range of Economic Impacts on Patients and Caregivers,” for researchers, value assessors, and other decision-makers to address the full range of economic impacts on patients.

During this year long initiative, IVI and AcademyHealth gathered insights and recommendations from more than 100 stakeholders to identify recommendations for researchers to incorporate patient and caregiver economic impacts into their work.

“It has been a joy to work with IVI and many leaders who contributed to this project by actively engaging diverse perspectives and demonstrating intentionality and inclusivity throughout the process,” says Elizabeth Cope, vice president of Health Systems Improvement at AcademyHealth. “This report represents the synthesis of multiple lines of thinking and reflects a genuine commitment to capturing the range of economic impacts that patients and caregivers experience.”

Six main areas of economic impacts emerged, including: direct medical costs, non-clinical healthcare costs, caregiver and family impacts, ability to work, and education and job impacts.

Project participants highlighted the need to account for underlying factors, such as social drivers of health, socioeconomic status, and health complexity in considering patients’ economic impacts.

Erica deFur Malik, IVI’s director of patient engagement, envisions this framework as a way to foster authentic partnerships between patients and researchers. “We see this framework as an important start to understanding the whole person when they have a significant encounter with the healthcare system,” says Malik. “Patient and caregiver insights need to drive research, and there needs to be acknowledgment that a patient is much more than their disease.”

This project is funded through a Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute® (PCORI) Eugene Washington PCORI Engagement Award EASCS-24274 and members of the Innovation and Value Initiative.

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About IVI
The Innovation and Value Initiative (IVI) is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt, non-profit research organization dedicated to advancing the science and improving the practice of health technology assessment through development of novel methods and the creation and application of enhanced health technology assessment models to support local decision-making needs in healthcare.

About AcademyHealth
AcademyHealth, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, is a national professional organization serving the fields of health services and policy research and the professionals who produce and use this important work. Together with their members, they offer programs and services that support the development and use of rigorous, relevant, and timely evidence to increase the quality, accessibility, and value of healthcare, to promote equity, and to improve health.

Contact: Smita Sanwardeker
Phone: 267.909.7661
E-Mail: smita.sanwardeker@thevalueinitiative.org