Guidance

Comprehensive Investment Appraisal (CIA) Model and guidance

Sets out the CIA Model and guidance on how it should be used to support economic appraisals in business cases in the NHS.

Documents

CIA model: version 3

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CIA Model: user guide

Details

The CIA Model is for use by the NHS to support economic appraisals in business cases. It replaces the Generic Economic Model (GEM).

The user guide shows how the CIA Model can be used to support economic appraisals in business cases. It provides guidance on the key economic principles, how these are used in economic appraisals and how the outcome of these appraisals is interpreted.

The CIA Model and guidance should be used for economic modelling for all investment business cases, with the exception of cases managed by NHS Digital. It should be read in conjunction with the latest edition of The Green Book.

Published 9 April 2019
Last updated 30 December 2019 + show all updates
  1. Updated with version 3 of the CIA model. The following changes have been made: the calculation for the discount rate of risks applying from year 66 to 70 has been corrected. Previously, the last 5 years of discount rates were missing for risks. The reference from SBs to the Benefits Log has been corrected. Previously SB6, SB7 and SB8 were referenced to the wrong name in the Benefits Log. The discounted SB6, SB7 and SB8 figures have been corrected. Previously they were referring to the wrong SBs. The number of CRBs, NCRBs and SBs that can be put in the model has increased from 8 to 15. The number of additional risks that can be put on the model has increased from 15 to 25. Updated with the user guide for the CIA model. The following change has been made: two references to OB forms have been deleted as they are no longer required.

  2. Updated with version 2 of the CIA Model. The following changes have been made: the calculation for optimism bias has been corrected to reflect how much the contribution is after mitigation. Risks are now also assessed incrementally to the baseline alongside costs and benefits. The cost discount rate for option 1 was corrected to reflect the full lifecycle of the project. Previously it was taking the discount rate from cost option 0.

  3. First published.