Data sources

The HIIC relies on four categories of data:

1. Epidemiological data
2. Health expenditure data
3. Income loss data
4. National population data

Epidemiological data

All epidemiological data, including prevalence rates, incidence rates, death rates, case-fatality rates, and disability rates, are extracted from the Institute for Health Metrics Evaluation (IHME) Global Health Data Exchange (GHDx) results tool, 2019. IHME is an independent global health research centre at the University of Washington. GHDx is an international disease data catalogue created and supported by IHME. You may access the GHDx results tool here.

GHDx results tool query parameters

You can replicate the input dataset downloaded from GHDx by visiting the results tool, and specifying the query parameters below:

Health expenditure data

In order to estimate health-system cost savings associated with health interventions, the HIIC requires input data on:

1. health expenditure by disease group;
2. health expenditure by disease phase (i.e., incident year, prevalent year, last year of life); and,
3. national population estimates

Health expenditure by disease group

Health expenditure per disease group data are sourced from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) report: Disease expenditure in Australia 2018-19. Specifically, the HIIC leverages Table 6: Health expenditure by conditions in disease groups, demographics and area of expenditure, 2018-19.

Health expenditure by disease phase

For each disease, the HIIC requires health expenditure estimates for three distinct disease phases: (1) incident year, i.e. the year in which an individual contracts the disease; (2) prevalent year(s), i.e. the year(s) following the incident year, in which an individual continues to lives with the disease with some level of disability; and (3) last year of life, i.e. the year in which an individual passes away.

Adjusting health expenditure estimates to introduce heterogeneity by disease phase requires input data on relative health expenditure incurred in each stage of the disease lifecycle: incident, prevalent, and last year of life. This input data is acquired from Blakely et al. (2019), who estimate health system costs by sex, age, and proximity to death in New Zealand.

Income loss data

In order to generate productivity gains associated with simulated health interventions, the HIIC requires income loss data disaggregated by sex, age, disease group. Morever, as with health expenditure data, for each disease, the HIIC requires income loss estimates for three distinct disease phases: (1) incident year, i.e. the year in which an individual contracts the disease; (2) prevalent year(s), i.e. the year(s) following the incident year, in which an individual continues to lives with the disease with some level of disability; and (3) last year of life, i.e. the year in which an individual passes away.

These income loss estimates are sourced from Blakely et al. (2021), who employ a fixed effects regression model to estimate within-individual income loss by disease in New Zealand. Income loss estimates are converted to Australian dollar terms using appropriate consumer price index (CPI) and purchasing power parity (PPP) adjustments.

National population data

In the processing of acute diseases, AIHW health expenditure data are combined with Australian national population estimates (2019) to produce expenditure per capita statistics. These population estimates are sourced from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).