Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) (United Kingdom) and Institut national d’excellence en santé et en services sociaux (INESSS) (Québec, Canada). Our analysis of the legal, administrative and procedural documents relating to the existence and assessment processes of these three agencies is guided by the following criteria: 1. The normative strength of the documents (categories of hard law or soft law) (2) 2. The defnition of the agencies’ social role (1) 3. The integration of ethics in the agencies’ mandate. RESULTS: Hard law contributes to establish a general mandate and some legal legitimacy for these agencies. Soft law, grounded in the HTA producers’ practices, plays a major role in the legal governance of HTA. Our results demonstrate that these agencies existing practices seem to circumscribe their social role further than their constitutive laws. In this context, social actors become responsible to defne, structure and operationalize the implementation of HTA. In addition, the legal framework (hard law) through which HTA unfolds does not clearly support its structural and social role. Despite existing legal frameworks, the normative legitimacy of HTA is not entirely established, as it depends on soft law. Taken altogether, this maintains a persisting conceptual vagueness in HTA governance. CONCLUSIONS: The social role of HTA should be defned either through modifying existing legislations (hard law) or through harmonization of the agencies internal policies and regulations (soft law). Such legal initiatives would help clarify the aims of HTA evaluations: assessments (scientifc) or appraisal (value-laden), and therefore give a clearer indication on how best to integrate ethics in HTA. REFERENCES: 1. Sandman L, Heintz E. Assessment vs. appraisal of ethical aspects of health technology assessment: can the distinction be upheld? GMS Health Technol Assess. 2014;10:1-9. 2. Tallacchini M. Governing by Values. EU Ethics: Soft Tool, Hard Efects. Minerva. 2009;47:281-306. ................................................................................... PP142 A Mental Health Hospital-based Health Technology Assessment In Quebec, Canada: Structure And Products AUTHORS: Ionela Gheorghiu (igheorghiu.iusmm@ssss.gouv.qc.ca), Alain Lesage, Adam Mongodin, Marlène Galdin INTRODUCTION: Our Hospital-based Health Technology Assessment unit (HB-HTA) was founded in 2011 following the nomination of Louis-H. Lafontaine hospital as the Montreal University Mental Health Institute (IUSMM). From the beginning, the HB-HTA has been supporting and advising the Chief Executive Ofcer of IUSMM in the decision-making process concerning the implementation of new technologies and practices in mental health. Since 2015, the HB-HTA is part of the East of Montreal Regional Integrated Health and Social Services Centre (CIUSSS de l’Est-de-l’Île de Montréal), continuing to support decisions in mental health. Currently, the HB-HTA unit is nested in the Quality, Performance and Ethics department. METHODS: Formed by a coordinator, a scientifc advisor and a manager, the HB-HTA team plans, organizes and sets up the evaluation activities. The unit benefts from the support of a Steering Committee which consists of representatives of clinical, administrative and research directions, as well as of health users and families. This committee determine the strategic orientation of the HB-HTA unit, prioritize the projects, approves the evaluation products and gives indications on the knowledge transfer process. ................................................................................................................................................................................... POSTER PRESENTATIONS 137 https://doi.org/10.1017/S0266462317002896 Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. IP address: 207.241.231.81, on 30 Oct 2018 at 05:55:25, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms.