The general objective of this proposal is to establish an effective and sustainable European Network for Health Technology Assessment – EUnetHTA that informs policy decisions. The overall strategic objective of the network is to connect public national health technology assessment (HTA) agencies, research institutions and health ministries, enabling an effective exchange of information and support to policy decisions by Member States. This implies that the network will help to provide reliable, timely, transparent and transferable information on the short- and long-term effectiveness of health technologies as input to decision-making in member states and in the EU. By doing this, the Network will assist the EU and its member states and the candidate countries to plan, deliver and monitor health services effectively. For this purpose the network will provide tools for tailoring this information. Sound clinical, epidemiological, organisational and economic evidence and information on patients’ needs and preferences are necessary to inform health policy decisions, combined with local, regional and national considerations on resources, societal values, ethics and priorities. The strategic objectives are: * To reduce overlap and duplication of effort and hence promote more effective use of resources * To increase HTA input to decision-making in member states and the EU and hence to increase the impact of HTA * To strengthen the link between HTA and health care policy making in the EU and its member states * To support countries with limited experience with HTA. This could potentially contribute to tackling variations in health and health inequalities in Europe, and ensure citizens greater equity of access, and more consistent care within and between European member countries – and increase the effective use of resources spent on health care in member states.
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The overarching objective of the Joint Action (JA) on Health Technology Assessment (HTA), EUnetHTA Joint Action, including work on relative effectiveness assessment (REA) of pharmaceuticals is to put into practice an effective and sustainable HTA collaboration in Europe that brings added value at the European, national and regional level. The JA brings together 34 HTA agencies and institutional producers of HTA and assessments of pharmaceuticals in 24 EU and 1 EEA/EFTA country (as of November 2010). The JA facilitates solutions to overcome barriers to collaboration and facilitates national solutions to deliver context specific reporting of HTA results.
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The Special Olympics EU Eurasia Foundation (SOEEF) is dedicated to providing critical services to children and adults with intellectual disabilities through ongoing training and competition, physical activities, inclusive sport, social inclusive initiatives and health services in all 28 Member States. The objectives are to offer quality training, competition, health screenings, and ongoing inclusive opportunities to athletes to maximize individual athlete potential, promote health and a healthy lifestyle both in sport and daily life, whilst reducing health inequalities and improving access to quality health services for people with intellectual disabilities.
In summary we can point out that people with intellectual disabilities have a wide range of chronic and acute health issues and conditions. In many instances, more frequent and severe symptoms than the general population; are twice as likely to have significant visual problems and at much younger age; are hardly ever engaged in vigorous physical activity and find it difficult to make themselves understood when speaking with health professionals; health conditions are may be similar to the general population, the impacts can be greater on those with ID; Experience higher mortality rates as a result of higher rates of cardiovascular diseases. Special Olympics EU Eurasia and its partner national programs provides its service to almost half a million individuals with intellectual disabilities across the EU driven mainly by volunteers.
The Healthy Athletes (HA) program provides access to health care for SO Athletes not only to improve their ability to improve health and fitness levels or to train and compete in SO events, but also to identify health care needs and to improve quality of health care for people with intellectual disabilities. The integrated health and physical activity action plan improves public health and reduces health inequalities of people with intellectual disabilities.
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This proposal lays out the Work Programme for 2017 within the contents of the Multiannual Work Plan for the European Reference Network for Craniofacial Anomalies and ENT disorders (ERN CRANIO). ERN CRANIO involves teams from 29 European hospitals (10 Member States) that provide care, education, teaching, research and management of rare craniofacial anomalies, cleft lip/palate and ENT disorders. Our vision is that the best multidisciplinary initial care for all those with craniofacial anomalies and ENT disorders is not a privilege to be purchased but a moral right secured for all European patients.
Our MISSION is to consistently and persistently strive towards achieving our vision through:
1. Establishment and management of a steady referral network for patients with craniofacial anomalies and ENT disorders throughout Europe; 2. Improvement of the quality of care, by enhancing diagnosis, treatment and follow-up of the patients with rare craniofacial anomalies and ENT disorders; 3. Minimization of the deviation from our operational standards and sharing best practices through suitable quality improvement initiatives, while monitoring their effectiveness using measures and indicators; 4. Stimulating innovation through multicentre research projects on (genetic) causes, pathophysiology, and associated problems, and introduction of eHealth; 5. Supporting the continuous learning and development of all our members by providing high quality educational and training opportunities to medical, nursing and other healthcare professionals; 6. Disseminating gained knowledge, making it available to all stakeholders.

In Year 1, ERN CRANIO will focus on collecting and analysing the available data on diagnoses, treatment, follow-up programmes, education and eHealth. In addition, the aim is to further expand the network in the first year by including relevant partners and experts. The results of the first year will set the agenda for subsequent years.
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The SPIM EU project aims at contributing to the reduction of cardio-metabolic morbidity and mortality in EU Member States by establishing the feasibility of implementing innovative selective prevention actions in primary care. In addition, the SPIM EU project will provide a toolbox for tailoring selective prevention actions in all EU Member States. The evidence based guideline of the Dutch College of General Practitioners represents an innovative approach for efficiently implementing selective prevention by a stepwise identification process of persons at high risk in the general population. However, successful implementation of this approach in EU Member States with different health care systems calls for tailoring of this action.The SPIM EU project includes five Work Packages (WP4-WP8), in addition to three horizontal Work Packages. WP4 includes the mapping of existing selective prevention programs in all EU Member States, and their strengths and weaknesses. In WP5 a systematic literature review will be conducted to summarize the knowledge from the literature about facilitating and hampering factors in implementing selective prevention programs and to identify determinants of their uptake and compliance. WP6 includes a survey among primary health care professionals and a sample of the general population in five EU Member States [SWE, DNK, NLD, CZE, GRE] to gain more insight into the task perceptions and attitudes towards selective prevention actions. In WP7 the results of WP4-WP6 will be collated and synthesized into tailored designs for implementing selective prevention actions (inspired by the Dutch guideline) in the five fore-mentioned EU Member States with the aim to test their feasibility. The feasibility tests are the core element of WP8. This will result in a toolbox of measures to tailor the implementation of selective prevention actions in all EU Member States taking their respective social, cultural, political and health care system contexts into account
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