The identification of unmet health-related needs is crucial for the development of a needs-based healthcare policy and innovation. Meeting unmet needs is a common objective of many stakeholders in the health system. Although there is no single definition of unmet health-related needs, there is a consensus that these can be approached both from the perspective of the individual patient and from the societal perspective.
To address this gap, the KCE and Sciensano launched the NEED project, which collects evidence on unmet health-related needs via a literature review, a patient survey, individual patient interviews, expert opinion and/or database analysis.
In the NEED project, health-related needs are defined as the specific needs related to a particular health condition, which encompasses the needs of individuals affected by the condition and possible broader societal needs that result from the impact of the condition on segments of society not directly afflicted by the condition (e.g. transmissibility, impact on informal caregivers, environmental impact).
For more info, please visit the NEED project page
Estimates of unmet health related needs
Literature Study
The literature review process includes a search for information on the defined criteria and indicators in the NEED framework.
Patient survey
Information regarding patients’ unmet health-related needs is collected via a patient survey, which is adapted to the specific health condition being studied.
Patient interview
Conducting interviews is an important part of the unmet needs assessment. Some information related to the indicators is collected through interviews.
Database analysis
Information is also collected from health-oriented databases including the Global burden of disease (GBD) and the Belgian national Burden of Disease study (BeBOD).
Explore estimates of unmet health-related needs
Criteria and indicators
Explore the criteria and indicators to assess the unmet health-related needs for each health condition included in the database. The indicators and criteria are organised according to the NEED framework domains (i.e. health, healthcare and social) and dimensions (i.e. patient, society and future).
Visuals
Visualize unmet health-related needs by disease and criteria.
Info
Consult the technical sheets for the different diseases and applied methodologies.
Download unmet health-related needs estimates
All estimates can be downloaded in .xslx format via Zenodo:
Partners
NEED is financially supported by the Belgian Federal Science Policy (BELSPO) through the INFRA-FED call
Citation
NEED collaborators (2024). Unmet health-related needs for three selected health conditions in Belgium (v2024-10-10) [Data set]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.12749982
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.