Partner news

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A decree has been recently adopted by the Public Health Ministry in Romania aiming a general evaluation and monitoring of the population's health, on a national scale. This program is meant to be a larger step towards reforming healthcare in Romania, which puts major accent on methods and processes for preventive healthcare and promoting a healthier way of life. The main purpose of this general program would be the acknowledgement of factors responsible for the most frequent diseases, early diagnosis and monitoring of the above mentioned disease, in order to prevent premature death. Another important priority due to this program is to improve general access to primary healthcare among the population.

Read more about the programme here.

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The European Master´s in Sustainable Regional Health Systems is an inter-university, multidisciplinary programme that provides high quality academic education and professional competencies for personnel working or intending to work in the area of health management. This European Master´s was created with the consortium of seven European universities with the aim of giving the managers and health professionals the vision, knowledge and tools to develop and manage coherent health systems that contribute both to health and sustainable regional development in their regional communities. We consider regions to be the most appropriate level for planning and managing a comprehensive health system. The European Union is committed to investing in successful and sustainable socio-economic regions. Regional health systems including health care and health improvement have an important contribution to make to achieve the goals of the Lisbon Agenda. This goes beyond providing quality services to their potential impact as economic, social and environmental organisations within regions.

This degree is designed to provide graduates, who hold a first degree of acceptable standard from any discipline, with a sound awareness of the principles and practice of managing progressive health organisations and/or developing successful enterprises within regional health systems. Our vision is of progressive managers and health entrepreneurs’ moving between the public and private sectors, developing career portfolios as needs and opportunities arise. Specific attention has been given to draw together the disciplines of public sector management, public policy, public health, business and science/technology.

Strengthening public and private health service involvement and looking to family/friends/neighbours as important co-operation partners is key to the agenda around long-term care. In particular, to ensure that people with chronic disease or disability health conditions, as well as their families, friends and neighbours know how to, appropriately, access, use and purchase health services. In considering how to get added value from health sector investments, long-term care is a new area of EMPLOYMENT opportunities for vulnerable social groups. In order to achieve this under the Health Cluster Net Agenda, a work package for local and regional activities has been developed in Alentejo region. This uses, wherever possible, different activities, e.g. exchanging best practice with health organizations and knowledge building seminars. The seminars are formal or informal workshop cross-linked with master classes in the social-organization of health care. The main subjects discussed in these meetings with public and private consultants, providers and advisors from Alentejo and Extremadura-Spain, are based on: (i) Equal opportunities, (ii) Employment opportunities, (iii) Public and private SME entrepreneurship in health care, (iv) Procurement policies, (v) Quality in long term care, (vi) New technologies in health care, (vii) Modernising health care policies and services.

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The most recent workshop in Evora (9 and 10 March 2007), as part of the regional action plan developed by the HCNet team from the University of Evora, focused on the theme “From quality of Health Care Organization to Social Inclusion in Health”. The workshop was held with the special collaboration of the Health ClusterNet Coordination Office. This event promoted discussion between local and regional development technicians on best practices for working with the target population in long-term care. The practical examples referred to were grouped in the following ways: “Health research policy and practice: knowledge transfer and exchange”, “Inter-organizational working for regional health development”, “The impact of Health ClusterNet Agenda on effective quality of health care inn Alentejo-Extremadura”, ”Alentejo’s health care tomorrow: what are the key priorities for the next years, through HCNet agenda?”.

Beyond the remarkable results and the decisive and effective role played by the local team structure in the management of the Alentejo HCNet action plan, we know that there is still a lot to do…

Related partner action flowing from the work of Health ClusterNET on affordable capital investment has included: the Scottish Health Minister Andy Kerr visited Tower Hill community health facility in Kirkby, Merseyside, with Mike Baxter, Head of capital and PFI in the Scottish Executive. This project had been one of the case studies presented at the Krakow workshop and the visit came about directly from networking at this Health ClusterNet event. In late April 2007 ChaMPs (the North West partner) facilitated a workshop to develop initial thinking and commitment to an intersectoral capital investment strategy for the North West. The HCN Executive Director gave a keynote presentation at the workshop that provided a basis for debate and discussion.

As a result, HCN has contributed to influencing Scottish Executive policy of capital investment in primary care & influencing the development of an intersectoral capital investment policy in North West as well as action in other partner regions.