Last week, the Decision Modeling Center hosted an interesting symposium. The event was opened by Dr. Coupé, chair of the DMC. She gave a nice overview of the research that is carried out by the DMC team, from past achievements to future directions.

Key note speakers: Prof. Berkhof and Dr. O’Mahony

The first keynote speaker, Prof. H. Berkhof, co-chair of the DMC and head of the department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at the VUmc, talked about vaccination of boys against HPV, a hot topic in the field of cervical cancer. Subsequently, Dr. J. O’Mahony from the Trinity College Dublin, discussed some pitfalls in cost-effectiveness analysis reminding us that models are often complex instruments and require careful application.

Science café

The science café was a moment of constructive discussion. PhDs and post-docs of the DMC team gave interesting pitches on different topics highlighting how their projects support and influence medical decision making.

Key note speakers: Prof. Joore and Prof. Vassall

In the second part, Prof. M. Joore, HTA expert from Maastricht University, discussed the problem of uncertainty in health economic modeling and gave us advices in how to handle and communicate uncertainty to policy makers. Prof. A. Vassall, health economist at the LSHTM, talked about incorporating demand and supply constraints in economic evaluations with some examples from low and middle income countries.

Keep an eye on the DMC website and social media if you want to attend future events!