The authors of the study used a multicriteria systems analysis approach to support strategic planning and priority setting in a particular area of healthcare — in this case, vaccines — to move beyond the traditional cost-effectiveness analysis approach.
They found the multicriteria systems analysis allowed for superior flexibility, transparency and clarity in decision support for public health issues when compared to the overly simplified cost-effectiveness analysis. The study findings also suggest more sophisticated systems-level analyses will become increasingly important to public health as disease burdens grow and resources become scarcer.
“The teaching of strategic planning in public health must be expanded in order to fill a void in the profession’s planning capabilities,” the authors wrote. “Public health training should actively incorporate model building, promote the interactive use of software tools and explore planning approaches that transcend restrictive assumptions of cost-effectiveness analysis.”
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