Introduction
Funding Health Services
HTA Review
Funding Health Services
The Australian Government assists Australians in accessing necessary health services and technologies by subsidising the cost of health-related goods and services through a range of different funding arrangements including public subsidy through the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) and the Medicare Benefits Schedule (MBS), and through private health insurance reimbursement of prostheses through the Prostheses List.This website provides an overview of the current Australian Government HTA processes used to inform decisions about the registration of health technologies for use in Australia, and the reimbursement provided under these funding programs.
The website provides information about these different programs and how they may interact with each other, as well as the roles, functions and inter-relationships of the expert advisory committees that assess and provide advice to Government about new and emerging health technologies. It provides links to the existing websites of these programs and expert advisory committees where more comprehensive information is available. This website does not replace or replicate these existing websites, but provides a guide to assist people to better access and to utilise information already available, and to understand how government processes work.
HTA Review
This website is part of the Australian Government’s response to the December 2009 Review of Health Technology Assessment in Australia (HTA Review). On 27 February 2010, the Minister for Health and Ageing, the Hon Nicola Roxon, and the then Minister for Finance and Deregulation, the Hon Lindsay Tanner, publicly released the Report of the Review of Health Technology Assessment in Australia, and announced the Government’s acceptance of 13 of the HTA Review’s 16 recommendations.The HTA Review recommendations are being phased in by the department. This is because some recommendations rely on the completion of others. Reforms to individual HTA processes need to be implemented so as to minimise the impact on 'business as usual'. Administrative changes need to be established before reforms to bring greater alignment between processes can occur. Processes will continue to be refined over time with phased implementation occurring from mid 2010 through 2011.
For an update on the progress of implementation of HTA Review recommendations click here.
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Page currency, Latest update: 16 September, 2010
