HEVAL4210 – Economic Evaluation and Decision-Analytic Modelling in Healthcare

Course content

Economic evaluation is an important decision-making tool in healthcare. It helps policymakers and planners choose between alternative actions to improve healthcare by systematically comparing the costs and health outcomes of different interventions. This course provides a comprehensive overview of economic evaluation, from its theoretical foundations to the practical application of decision-analytic modelling.

Students will learn how to define a decision problem, collect the necessary evidence, and use mathematical relationships to model the costs and health effects of different alternatives over time. The course will combine a mix of lectures, practical exercises, and computer lab sessions to provide both the conceptual knowledge and the hands-on skills required to perform and critically appraise economic evaluations.

The course aims to introduce the fundamental principles of economic evaluation while also providing practical skills in decision-analytic modelling. The course provides an overview of key decision models in healthcare, including decision trees, Markov models and partitioned survival models.

Learning outcome

Knowledge

Upon successful completion, you will know:

  • The theoretical basis of economic evaluation and modelling

  • The different types of economic evaluations

  • The concepts of cost, measuring and valuing costs, and discounting

  • How to measure and value health outcomes in monetary units and as quality-adjusted life-years

  • How to evaluate diagnostic uncertainty using sensitivity and specificity

  • How to develop decision-analytic models

  • How to perform and interpret probabilistic analysis (PA) and survival models

Skills

You will be able to:

  • Critically read and appraise economic evaluation studies

  • Estimate health-related quality of life and quality-adjusted life years

  • Define a decision problem and translate it into a decision-analytic model

  • Develop decision trees, Markov models and partitioned survival models in Excel/R

  • Conduct time-to-event analysis

  • Evaluate uncertainty in decision models

Competence

You will be able to:

  • Understand and evaluate different types of economic evaluations

  • Perform model-based decision analysis

  • Present policy recommendations based on evidence from economic evaluations

Admission to the course

This course is only available for students at the following master's programmes:

Students who are admitted to study programmes at UiO must each semester register which courses and exams they wish to sign up for?in Studentweb.

If you are not already enrolled as a student at UiO, please see our information about?admission requirements and procedures.

Teaching

The course consists of a combination of lectures, integrated seminars, and hands-on computer lab sessions. Course materials, including exercises, templates, and previous exams, will be made available on Canvas.

Examination

Written examination, individual

Examination and grading at The Faculty of Medicine.

Language of examination

  • For students at Eu-HEM: English

  • For students at HEPMA: The problem set will be given in English. Answers can be given in Norwegian, Swedish, Danish or in English.

Grading scale

Grades are awarded on a scale from A to F, where A is the best grade and F?is a fail. Read more about?the grading system.

Resit an examination

For Eu-HEM students:

An EU-hem student cannot present her or himself for the examination in a course more than two times. There will be held re-sits for EU-hem students who have failed an exam or who have legitimate absence (usually illness) in January and August. If you are entitled to a re-sit you must contact the student advisor via email no longer than one week after the result of the exam has been published.

More about examinations at UiO

You will find further guides and resources at the web page on examinations at UiO.

Last updated from FS (Felles studentsystem) Nov. 19, 2025 8:58:09 PM

Facts about this course

Level
Master
Credits
10
Teaching
Spring
Teaching language
English