The use of pharmacoeconomics in the early stages of clinical evidence development has been proposed since the mid-1990s. Since then, early health technology assessment has emerged and frequently applied to support medical product development and market access.

The most frequently used methodology in early health technology assessment is early-stage (or iterative) health economic modeling including headroom analysis.

Future developments should focus on the integration of early health economic models with systems engineering approaches, such as multi-criteria decision analysis and optimization methods, to actually support decisions in medical product development.