Here IFIC Senior Fellow Margrieta Langins provides an update on the SUSTAIN Project as it enters the final stage.
SUSTAIN is coming to the end of a three-year collaboration between research partners, policy organizations and 13 clinical sites across nine countries including Austria, Belgium, Estonia, Germany, Ireland, Norway, Spain, The Netherlands and the UK. The team met in Hamburg in May 2018 for a pre-final meeting as teams prepare their overarching analyses of interventions introduced to improve integrated services for older people living with complex conditions.
Conversations revolved primarily around the Roadmap on which IFIC is leading together with EHMA, LSE, PRAXIS, VILANS and AGE-platform. The Roadmap aims to serve those policy makers tasked with the responsibility of designing and implementing similar services.
Together with all consortium members the group discussed the key design features that have emerged as necessary for clinical site managers to oversee in implementing. Key questions were:
– What are the essential processes that need to be in place?
– What have been the facilitating and resisting factors in implementing improvements to integrated care?
– Who are the key actors we need to engage or engage more?
Knowing this helps us understand the various paths that countries can take towards creating an enabling environment that ensures services can deliver integrated care for older persons living with multiple complex conditions.
During October and November 2018 an international consultation on the Roadmap will be conducted to gather from policy makers and decision makers on the Roadmap’s usefulness. If you are a policy maker or tasked with overseeing health and social services delivery in your country, we invite you to sign up to take part in this consultation. Those interested should email: info@integratedcarefoundation.org
The overall aims of SUSTAIN are:
- to improve established integrated care initiatives for older people living at home with multiple health and social care needs, ensuring they are patient-centred, prevention oriented, efficient, resilient to crises, safe and sustainable.
- to ensure that improvements to the integrated care initiatives are applicable and adaptable to other health systems and regions in Europe.
The project is funded by Horizon 2020, the European Commission’s funding programme to support research activities. Click here for more information about IFIC’s involvement in the Sustain Project
Margrieta Langins is a senior Fellow with IFIC and highly experienced international health consultant. She joined IFIC in November 2017 to work on the EU’s SUSTAIN project to develop a roadmap for supporting older people in their homes.