Problems and methods in health care economics: is personalized medicine an exception?

Objective For the economic evaluation of medical services, a well-established range of methods is available. The aim of this paper is to determine how and to what extent these methods are applicable to the much-discussed area of personalized medicine and which features may be encountered and how they can be addressed. Methods For this study, an exploratory literature search was conducted. Results In contrast to conventional medicine, personalized medicine might be considered either in terms of physiological differences or in terms of individual preferences of the participants. Depending on the approach, there are different implications for the methodological challenges in health economic evaluations. Improving health care provision regarding physiological differences brings up the problem of parameterization, since evidence is often very weak due to small sample sizes. Value of information analysis can reveal details about the potential benefits of further research. The concept of "expected value of individualized care" provides a very similar approach to the value of information analysis to quantify the potential value of including individual preferences in the health care provision. Welfarism and Extra Welfarism offer different solutions, such as how benefits of biomarker-based information in the sense of "empowerment" can be included in evaluations. Conclusion In general, the methods of economic evaluation are applicable to the field of personalized medicine. However, a number of specific challenges exist. Further research is necessary to solve these problems.