CReHTA

CReHTA is the Regional Centre for Health Technology Assessment. It was established at AReSS by DGR 524/2018 and in 2021, after appropriate national selection, was recognised as a Collaborating Centre to the National HTA Programme for Medical Devices. Currently, together with the Veneto and Emilia-Romagna Region HTA Centres, it is one of the three existing Collaborating Centres in Italy.

Objectives

The CReHTA aims to implement the indications of the National HTA Programme for Medical Devices (PN HTA DM) through codified mechanisms of prioritisation, peer review and stakeholder involvement in the reporting and assessment of health technologies.

The Regional HTA Centre is made up of suitably trained personnel with appropriate skills belonging to the Evaluation and Research Area and can avail itself, if necessary, of qualified multidisciplinary figures (domain experts) capable of carrying out evaluations of the salient aspects of a technology and its impact if compared to similar existing or coexisting technologies in the NHS, according to scientifically recognised quality criteria.

The CReHTA is the HUB of the Apulian HTA Network and has the task of providing evidence in support of health policy choices through the production of reports (HTA Reports) or "HTA oriented" documents on appropriately indicated technologies, not prioritised at a national level and of strategic regional interest; it must ensure independence from relations with producers and/or distributors of health technologies and support the collaborative network of company HTA referents and HTA Technical Tables. It promotes a culture of assessment and use of evidence in healthcare planning and clinical practice and must ensure an independent editorial process that separates the assessment phase from the recommendation formulation phase (appraisal).

Activities

The act of organisation and operation of the CReHTA defines the activities of the centre:

standardisation of the application procedure for the introduction of new health technologies in order to clearly identify the objectives of the acquisition and the evidence supporting it;
standardisation of procedures for reporting the experimental use of a technology;
standardisation of procedures for reporting a health technology;
reconnaissance of requests for the introduction of health technologies in the structures of the SSR and creation of a database useful for the governance of regional technological innovation;
prioritisation of technologies to be subjected to assessment in accordance with the criteria indicated in the State-Region Agreement Rep. Atti 157/CSR of 21 September 2017 concerning the strategic document for Health Technology Assessment (HTA) and development of the relevant grid;
dissemination of HTA assessments and products of the National Medical Devices HTA Programme (PNHTADM) in the regional HTA network;
production of evaluation documents and guidelines concerning HTA;
verification of the level of use of HTA products and the impact on the territory of the evaluations produced or disseminated by the centre.