International Journal of Integrated Care | 2021
Better system integration and patient management through coordination of interregional policies and innovative programmes - international consortium Regions4PerMed for a fast and deep uptake of personalised health
Abstract
Introduction The challenge for national and regional authorities is to enable the shift from a reactive healthcare system (based on episodic and acute care model) to a preventive (stratifying at-risk individuals and ensure that preventive action is taken to intervene well before the onset of symptoms, let alone illness) and predictive (leverage and integrate cutting-edge technologies to not only stratify risk but even predict risk and intervene further upstream) system – the so-called personalised health for better system integration and patient management. Theory/Methods The project is organised as a technical dialogue with the health care system s stakeholders. This dialogue consists of five steps (in years 2018-2022): 1. A preparation paper which analyses the state-of-the-art aspects and highlights the challenges of each Key Strategic Area. 2. A thematic interregional workshop around the topic. Carry out five capacity-building workshops for regional authorities in order to build up expertise and skills within the regional authorities about the use and exploitation of the knowledge created within Regions4PerMed. 3. Five conferences in different regions and cities in order to have a wider geographical outreach, plus the kick-off and the final conference. 4. Two in situ visits for each Key Strategic Area to highly innovative labs, institutes or companies and gather innovative models and best practice examples. 5. A workshop report containing, among others: a.Policy recommendations for European, national and regional policymakers. b.R&D investment recommendations. c.Innovation models and best practices. Regions4PerMed consortium directs major efforts towards coordinating and aligning relevant stakeholders in personalised health action across Europe and beyond, create a participatory approach, build trust, enable a multi-stakeholder process, and channel investments towards personalised health.\xa0 The key strategic areas (covering the discussion about the big data and machine learning in medicine, m-health and e-health services supporting health care integration and innovation in medical sciences, but also all the social aspects) explore regional challenges from the regulatory, economics, cultural, responsible research and innovation, gender point of view. Results The final outcome of the project will be the elaboration and release of the interregional action plan. The most important impact of Regions4PerMed will be a strengthening of links between European regions setting up or planning personalised medicine healthcare approaches. Discussion For the consortium it will be important to understand how other European Union regions are tackling the challenges, get state of the art analyses from relevant stakeholders (evidence-based decisions), share views and update policies, contribute to shaping a common agenda, identify common investment areas and push for as well as offer commitment. Overall, this will result in a coherent, science-founded basis for decision-making. Conclusions Regions4PerMed will provide policy recommendations to regional, national and European policymakers. Public policy should incorporate rapid learning and predictive modeling to gain the full benefits of personalized medicine. The results of each key strategic areas define the main challenges and main bottlenecks. The analysis of best practices offers the chance to highlight the most innovative models, with the best results for a given bottleneck or challenge.