Eyes on the prize: early economic evaluation to guide translational research: examples from the development of biomarkers for type 2 diabetes

The Center for Translational Molecular Medicine (CTMM) was a large public-private partnership that existed between 2008 and 2016. It was dedicated to the development of new technologies in molecular medicine. The main objectives of the CTMM were to reduce mortality in the Dutch population by 20% and healthcare expenditures by 1 billion Euro’s by 2019. The PREDDICCt project (€18.4 million budget) was one of the projects of the CTMM. This project aimed to develop innovative biomarker-based technologies to identify individuals at high risk of developing type 2 diabetes or its complications. In my doctoral research we evaluated the output of the PREDICCt project. To that end, we developed new methods for the early economic evaluation of biomedical innovation.
We assessed in which application new biomarkers for type 2 diabetes would have the largest clinical and economic value and estimated the value of the biomarkers developed in the PREDICCt project. We have concluded that the developed biomarkers, as well as number of the applications for which the project aimed to develop new biomarkers, have very limited value and are unlikely to result in useful new technologies.
Based on our research, we concluded that the main objectives of the CTMM have not been achieved. We have, however, demonstrated that using early economic evaluation it is possible to identify the most promising research strategies before the start and during translational research projects. This can prevent the waste of public and private research funding in the future.