Framework for Assessing the Value of Healthcare Innovations in India for Universal Health Coverage

Health is an important contributor to economic and social wellbeing, and has been the focus of many social enterprises. Healthcare, whose primary purpose is to preserve or promote health, is a multi-billion-dollar industry that is growing very rapidly given the push of innovations for value addition. However, there is very limited literature on how to assess the value of a healthcare innovation. Hence, in this paper, we propose a framework to assess the value of healthcare innovations using an ecosystems approach within the context of Universal Health Coverage (UHC). The proposed framework has four dimensions, with measurable and analyzable attributes within each dimension. The four value dimensions are relevance, effectiveness, frugality and equity. A case study on digital health innovations has been used to discuss this framework to provide a nuanced understanding of the value of digital health innovations in India for social enterprises and policymakers. This proposed framework is a work in progress for discussion among scholars in this field as well as further empirical testing and refinement in different country contexts.