In an area as important as the allocation of public funds earmarked for the reimbursement of health technologies, it is of utmost importance to ensure transparency of data, enabling openness of the public debate regarding citizens’ equal access to health services, social justice and the decision-making process. It is equally important to allow scientific analysis of the technologies applied for by experts in various fields of medicine and other stakeholders.
The Agency for Health Technology Assessment and Tariff System monitors the scope of data marked in analyses submitted by entities applying for reimbursement of medical technologies. Among others, economic and clinical data are subject to secrecy. A summary of information indicated to be kept confidential by the applicants in the assessment of reimbursement applications, the disclosure of which is requested by the Agency, is presented in the Table below. The chart below presents the percentage share of information marked as confidential in relation to all information in selected areas of applicants’ analyses included in reimbursement applications assessed by the Agency in individual quarters.
The Transparency Council, in its Resolution No. 8/2022 of 10 January 2022, noted that the amount of information marked as confidential was too high. This results in the exclusion of a significant part of the data in the Agency’s verification analyses, the positions of the Transparency Council and the recommendations of the President of the Agency, which are part of public information. The debate on the information that it is not in the public interest to be marked in the applicants’ documents, as well as in the documentation produced by the Agency, should allow to introduce changes in the approach to the applicants’ transparency policy. This policy should aim to make health technology assessment data publicly available as fully as possible, while protecting business secrets, for the benefit of patients and respecting the right to public scrutiny of actions to make decisions on the allocation of public funds.