Equity and the Socioeconomic Impact of Disease Management Programmes in Denmark

First, how can we evaluate the impact of complex disease management programmes? The nationwide programmes are an interdisciplinary and intersectoral concept for the development of systematic and evidence-based treatment programmes. A detailed programme description will be formulated for several chronic diseases including diabetes, lumbar and back disorders, cardiovascular diseases, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, schizophrenia and cancer rehabilitation based on a generic model of disease management. Interdisciplinary interventions such as these are very important but also represent a challenge in relation to traditional evaluation techniques.

The project will analyse the origin and implementation of disease management programmes in Denmark. Subsequently, the research will assess the impact on selected groups of patients with the help of health registry and survey data.

The other main objective of the project is to focus on the equity of the impact on health as one element in the health economics assessment of disease management programmes. Although health economics is good at evaluating the impact on costs, it is less well developed in assessing whether new forms of treatment are equally effective for different groups of patients.

“The project will demonstrate how equality can be factored in as one element of this health economics evaluation theory and how this can influence the evaluation of health interventions. In overall terms, the project will provide thorough and innovative input to assessing the socioeconomic impact associated with using health research for developing and implementing disease prevention programmes for the major disease categories in Denmark,” says Karsten Vrangbæk.

Watch this short video presentation of project

Karsten Vrangbæk, professor Public Health and Political Science, University of Copenhagen

Kristian Schulz Hansen, Associate professor, Public Health, UCPH

Hans Keiding, Professor Emeritus, Economics, UCPH

Henrik Brønnum Hansen, Associate professor, Public Health, UCPH

Anne Mette Bender, Post Doc, Public Health, UCPH

Inge-Lise Andersen, Associate professor, UCPH

Ina Willaing Tapager, PhD student, Public Health, UCPH