PECUNIA · Project

Standardized Cost-Comparison Tools for Health Treatments Across European Countries

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Imagine you want to compare the real cost of treating depression in Germany versus Spain — but every country measures costs differently, includes different things, and uses different price lists. It's like trying to compare grocery bills when one store prices by weight and another by volume. PECUNIA built a common measuring tape: standardized templates and methods so you can finally compare healthcare costs, patient outcomes, and societal impact across 6 European countries in an apples-to-apples way. They tested it on three mental health conditions — depression, schizophrenia, and PTSD — covering costs from hospitals to lost workdays to informal family care.

By the numbers

European countries covered by validated costing methods

Standardized costing templates produced (health/social care, criminal justice/education, production loss, patient/family care)

Partners in the consortium

Mental health conditions used for validation (depression, schizophrenia, PTSD)

Months of development and validation

Total deliverables produced

The business problem

What needed solving

Comparing healthcare costs across European countries is nearly impossible today because every country measures differently — different price lists, different cost categories, different methods. A pharma company submitting an HTA dossier in 3 countries must essentially build 3 separate economic models from scratch. This wastes months of consulting time and produces results that cannot be meaningfully compared.

The solution

What was built

PECUNIA built 4 standardized costing templates covering health and social care, criminal justice and education, production loss of paid and unpaid work, and patient/family/informal care. These are validated tools for self-reported resource use measurement, reference unit cost valuation, cross-national health utility assessment, and broader wellbeing measurement — tested across 6 countries using 3 mental health conditions.

Audience

Who needs this

Pharma market access teams preparing multi-country HTA dossiersHealth economics consulting firms running cross-border cost-effectiveness studiesNational HTA agencies seeking harmonized evaluation methodsHealth insurers evaluating the full societal cost of chronic conditionsMental health service providers benchmarking costs across regions

Business applications

Who can put this to work

Pharmaceutical & Biotech

enterprise

Target: Pharma companies preparing Health Technology Assessment (HTA) dossiers for market access across European countries

If you are a pharma company preparing pricing and reimbursement submissions for a new psychiatric drug across multiple EU markets — PECUNIA developed standardized costing templates covering health and social care, criminal justice, education, and lost productivity. These let you build consistent cross-country cost-effectiveness models using validated methods from 6 European countries, instead of reinventing the methodology for each submission.

Health Economics Consulting

any

Target: Consulting firms specializing in health economic evaluations and real-world evidence studies

If you are a health economics consultancy running multi-country economic evaluations for clients — PECUNIA created validated tools for self-reported resource use measurement and reference unit cost valuation across 6 countries (AT, DE, ES, HU, NL, UK). These ready-made templates for 4 cost sectors eliminate months of ad-hoc methodology development and improve the comparability and transferability of your analyses.

Health Insurance & Managed Care

enterprise

Target: Health insurers and payers evaluating coverage decisions for mental health treatments

If you are a health insurer trying to understand the true societal cost of mental health conditions beyond just medical bills — PECUNIA built costing templates that capture patient and family care costs, production losses from paid and unpaid work, and criminal justice costs. These tools help you make coverage decisions based on the full economic picture across 4 cost sectors, not just the clinical spend you see in claims data.

Frequently asked

Quick answers

How much would it cost to implement these costing tools in our organization?

The PECUNIA costing templates and methods are research outputs from a publicly funded EU project, so the underlying methodology is published in academic literature. Implementation costs would depend on adapting the templates to your specific country and disease area. Based on available project data, the tools were validated across 6 countries with different health system maturity levels, suggesting they are designed to be adaptable.

Can these tools scale beyond the 3 mental health conditions they were tested on?

The project explicitly designed the tools to be multi-sectoral and multi-national — depression, schizophrenia, and PTSD were used as illustrative examples for cost assessment, not as the only applications. The 4 costing templates cover generic cost sectors (health and social care, criminal justice and education, production loss, patient and family care) that apply to any disease area.

What is the IP situation — can we use these methods freely?

PECUNIA was a Research and Innovation Action (RIA) funded under Horizon 2020, which typically requires open access to publications. The costing templates are deliverables of a publicly funded project. Specific licensing terms should be confirmed with the coordinator at Medizinische Universität Wien.

Which countries are covered and how transferable are the results?

The tools were developed and validated across 6 countries: Austria, Germany, Spain, Hungary, Netherlands, and the UK. These include 3 countries with established national unit cost programmes (DE, NL, UK) and 3 with early-stage initiatives (AT, ES, HU), so the methods are designed to work across varying levels of health economic infrastructure.

How long did it take to develop these tools and are they ready to use?

The project ran for 36 months (January 2018 to June 2021) and is now closed. It produced 7 deliverables including 4 standardized costing templates. The tools have been validated across 6 countries but would need adaptation for specific organizational use cases.

How do these tools integrate with existing HTA processes?

PECUNIA was specifically designed to support Health Technology Assessment by improving the quality, comparability, and transferability of economic evaluations in Europe. The project addressed both health and social care perspectives and broader societal perspectives, aligning with the different analytical requirements of national HTA bodies across the 6 partner countries.

Consortium

Who built it

The PECUNIA consortium of 10 partners across 6 countries is heavily academic: 7 universities and 2 research organizations, with only 1 industry partner (10% industry ratio). This is typical for health economics methods research and means the outputs are rigorous but will need commercial packaging for business use. The geographic spread across Austria, Germany, Spain, Hungary, Netherlands, and the UK is strategically chosen to represent both mature HTA markets (DE, NL, UK) and developing ones (AT, ES, HU), making the tools relevant across different regulatory environments. The coordinator, Medizinische Universität Wien, is a well-established medical university. With only 1 SME in the consortium, commercial exploitation pathways may not be fully developed.

MEDIZINISCHE UNIVERSITAET WIENCoordinator · AT
BUDAPESTI CORVINUS EGYETEMparticipant · HU
LONDON SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS AND POLITICAL SCIENCEparticipant · UK
EURICE EUROPEAN RESEARCH AND PROJECT OFFICE GMBHparticipant · DE
SERVICIO CANARIO DE LA SALUDparticipant · ES
UNIVERSITEIT MAASTRICHTparticipant · NL
UNIVERSITAETSKLINIKUM HAMBURG-EPPENDORFparticipant · DE
UNIVERSITY OF BRISTOLparticipant · UK
ERASMUS UNIVERSITEIT ROTTERDAMparticipant · NL

How to reach the team

Coordinator is Medizinische Universität Wien (Austria). Use SciTransfer's contact service to reach the project team.

Order a report on this consortium See MEDIZINISCHE UNIVERSITAET WIEN profile →

Next steps

Talk to the team behind this work.

Want to use PECUNIA's cross-country costing tools for your HTA submissions or economic evaluations? SciTransfer can connect you directly with the research team and help assess which templates fit your specific market access needs.

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