Machine Learning for Precision Health Economics and Outcomes Research (P-HEOR): Conceptual Review of Applications and Next Steps

Precision health economics and outcomes research (P-HEOR) integrates economic and clinical value assessment by explicitly discovering distinct clinical and health care utilization phenotypes among patients. Through a conceptualized example, the objective of this review is to highlight the capabilities and limitations of machine learning (ML) applications to P-HEOR and to contextualize the potential opportunities and challenges for the wide adoption of ML for health economics. We outline a P-HEOR conceptual framework extending the ML methodology to comparatively assess the economic value of treatment regimens. Latest methodology developments on bias and confounding control in ML applications to precision medicine are also summarized.