ICCONIC: International Collaborative on Costs, Outcomes, and Needs in Care.

Across health systems, high-need, high-cost (HNHC) patients tend to constitute a relatively small segment of the population while accounting for a disproportionately large share of healthcare expenditures. Little is known, however, about how patterns of healthcare utilization, spending, and outcomes for HNHC patients vary across health systems.

The ICCONIC effort is a partnership of 16 collaborators from North America, Europe, Asia, and the Pacific committed to advancing the development of methods and measures in comparative health systems research. Countries include England, the United States, Canada (Ontario), Denmark, Finland, France, Sweden, Australia (New South Wales), New Zealand, the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, Spain (Aragon), Korea, and Singapore. The ultimate objective of the collaborative is to increase the availability of patient-level data and leverage data linkages to conduct cross-country analysis and provide policymakers with insights into how different care strategies and treatments might influence care quality, cost and outcomes.