Health economic data collection tools for health care research and practice: Protocol for a systematic scoping review

Background: Reliable cost and resource use data (hereafter referred to as cost data) forms the foundation of all economic evaluations and is essential for informing the implementation and scale-up of interventions found to be effective and efficient. Despite their importance, health intervention cost estimates are often missing, their methods of collection lack sufficient detail required for replication, and the quality of the tools used is seldom addressed in the literature. Cost data collection tools have been developed for a variety of contexts and study designs; however, none are widely adopted in practice. Aims: Undertake a systematic scoping review of scientific and grey literature to identify cost data collection tools for health services and public health research. Methods: A systematic scoping review of scientific (peer reviewed) literature and a scoping review of grey literature will be conducted in parallel. Both searches will be limited to tools available in English between January 2015 and December 2025. The tools must be publicly available (both free and for fee) for immediate use (requiring minimal adaptation). Discussion: The findings of this scoping review will provide researchers and health service staff cost data collection tools available for immediate use. This information is also intended to inform the development of future tools for cost data collection in health services and prevention research. Such a tool will facilitate collection of urgently needed cost and resource use data to inform investment decision making, policy and practice in health services and population health care.