HCPwebsite

The First Euro Consumer Diabetes Index will be launched September 30th

Empowerment of the diabetes patient is crucial. Diabetes is now becoming a pandemic all across Europe. The treatment of diabetes is complex, involving numerous lifestyle adaptations and requiring a great deal of teaching and support. Health Consumer Powerhouse is therefore currently working on the inaugural Euro Consumer Diabetes Index (Diabetes Index). The Project Manager for the Diabetes Index is Dr. Beatriz Cebolla. The Diabetes Index will be launched and published on September 30^th.

The reference panel assisting in that work consists of:

Dr. Inge Duimel ( Netherlands ),

Dr. Gabriel Gímenez Pérez ( Spain ),

Prof. Simon Pruna ( Romania ),

Dr. Tarvo Rajasalu ( Estonia ),

Prof. Urban Rosenqvist ( Sweden ),

Dr. Eric Senneville ( France ),

Dr. Fred Storms ( Netherlands ),

Prof. Jan Vavrinec ( Czech Republic ).

Euro Consumer Heart Index 2008

The Euro Consumer Heart Index 2008, benchmarking care for heart disease in all the EU-27 countries plus Norway and Switzerland, published on July 3, shows some interesting differences in European cardiovascular care:

· Prevention, such as stimulating lifestyle changes (healthier drinking habits, smoking reduction, more fruit, vegetables and exercise) is an area where many European countries could greatly improve. This would be a low-cost way to better cardiac health, particularly if screening for heart disease, also cheap and simple, were included as has recently been decided in e.g. Slovenia and the U.K.

· The use of vital medication for heart disease shows such a great variation across Europe that it is actually difficult to see any connection to heart disease rates. A better adherence to guidelines for the use of drugs could most probably both save lives and lower total healthcare costs!

Arne Björnberg

VP R&D, Health Consumer Powerhouse

Do you have a weak heart? Move to Luxembourg if you want to get really good care! And get out of Romania as quick as you can!

Luxembourg treats hearts best according to the 2008 Euro Consumer Hearth Index, launched today in Brussels during a press conference hosted by the Health Consumer Powerhouse. There is a small group of countries that follow in this competition for excellence, separated only by some differences: France, Norway and Switzerland.

The Index compares 29 European cardiovascular healthcare systems in five categories, covering 28 performance indicators. The new Euro Consumer Heart Index conclusively demonstrates that effective prevention programs deliver a clear return on investment. Europe-wide gap is between guidelines for heart disease management; the realities of day to day clinical practice are also evident. Few countries have national screening programs and there is widespread under-use of medication, despite well accepted guidelines.

You can read the Recommendations for each country or go to the Media room to see the full Report, the Matrix and the Press releases.

Euro Consumer Heart Index 2008

Local press releases

Backgrounders

TEMPORARY EMAIL PROBLEMS

As to confirm Murphy's laws, we are experiencing some problems with our server the day before the launch... therefore our email accounts do not function very well; for any urgent information please contact our Director for European Affairs, Ms. Kajsa Wilhelmsson, at +32496235530. Hopefully this problem will be solved as soon as possible.

Euro Consumer Heart Index 2008

On the 3rd of July we launch the Euro Consumer Heart Index 2008. You will find the report on our website by noon.

The new Index provides a ranking of cardiovascular healthcare systems in all the 27 European Union Member States, as well as Norway and Switzerland. Built with specific indicators, this Index assesses five key areas to the consumer: Information, consumer rights and choice, Access, Prevention, Procedures and Outcomes.

Denmark - the champion in patients' rights and information

Denmark did not qualify for the football Euro Cup 2008. But Danish Minister of Health, Mr. Jakob Axel Nielsen, will receive tomorrow morning a Health Consumer Powerhouse diploma during a seminar in the Danish Parliament. The seminar is a co-operation between the Danish Liberal Party in the Folketing, the ALDE group in the European Parliament and the Powerhouse. For patients' rights and information Denmark is the champion, as stated in the Euro Health Consumer Index 2007. They lead the way in consumer and patient involvement in healthcare, which will be a strategic resource for improving healthcare in an "age-ing" Europe.

Johan Hjerqvist

The Swedish Breast-Cancer Nurse of the Year

The new Swedish Novartis award “The breast cancer nurse of the year” was shared between Ms. Ingalill Koinberg and Ms. Gull-Britt Engholm and awarded for their contribution and dedication within the breast cancer care field. Together they have made a report on the follow-up of breast cancer surgery. They also produced a health economics study which will be available soon.

You can contact the two winners for more information:

Ingalill Koinberg, FOU/U-enheten, Sjukhuset i Varberg, +46-340-48 19 64, +46-709-35 03 86, ingalill.koinberg@lthalland.se

Gull-Britt Engholm, onkologimottagningen, Örebro Universitetssjukhus, +46-196-02 13 78, gullbritt.engholm@orebroll.se

Ms. Wilhelmsson to preset at the 11th European Health Forum in Gastein, Austria

Ms. Wilhelmsson will give a presentation during the 11^th European Health Forum Gastein, "Values in Health - from Visions to Reality", which will take place between the 1st and the 4th of October 2008 in Bad Hofgastein, Salzburg, Austria. You can find the programme here.

Mr. Johan Hjertqvist speaks at the McGill University in Montreal

Tomorrow, May 29, Johan Hjertqvist speaks at the McGill University in Montreal, Canada. The theme of the two-day Conference is “The Canadian healthcare system comes of age. A framework for the 21st century care”. Mr. Hjertqvist's session, enjoying prestigious European participation such as Dr. Benhard Merkel, Head of the Health Strategy Unit of the DG Sanco, will focus on how Canada can best learn from European experience.

Google ready to launch new health service

The launch of Google Health has been discussed for almost a year. Making the storage of patient data always available would ease changes (e.g. information about their doctors). The project seems to be in a testing phase though. There is probably still a long way to go before a full scale launch.

The system seems to be highly adapted to the US and its low degree of electronic patient journals, specific insurances, many visits to the doctor and movable population.

The interesting part is not the online storage of one’s own data - which is already available here - but the possibilities of data mining. Here is a jokingly example taken from Blogoscoped:

“On the positive side the benefits to healthcare and science are also staggering. Giving scientists "aggregated" data stripped of Personally Health Information (PHI) in a large scale along with the aggregated browsing, shopping, and email habits would be enormous.

Think of the connections that could be made.

"AMA Study Shows: Porn site visitors have an 80% increase risk of suffering from Carpal Tunnel Syndrome." Turns out it isn’t the chairs and keyboards at work that is the problem, it’s the porn on the computer!”

Google has been very good at convincing people to share their search history, emails and calendars, so they should now be ready to share their medical records as well.

Oscar Hjertqvist

Healthcare, the Market, and the Public's Needs and Interests, Warsaw

Mr. Hjertqvist will speak about The Europe of Health Consumers during the "Healthcare, the Market, and the Public's Needs and Interests" Conference that will take place in Warsaw, Poland, on the 2nd of June. For more details, the list of speakers and the program of the conference click here.

Rx&D / IFPMA Policy Conference, Montreal

During the Joint Rx&D / IFPMA Policy Conference - "Putting the Pieces Together: International Best Practices in Access to Pharmaceutical Innovation", Mr Hjertqvist will compare healthcare access and outcomes based on our Euro-Canada Health Consumer Index 2008.

The Health Consumer Powerhouse accepted as expert in the A.M.I. database of the European Comission

The Directorate-General for Health and Consumer Protection of the European Commission has accepted our request for insertion in their A.M.I. database of suppliers; the categories for which we were included as experts in project management and / or consumer policy are Health Information and Project Evaluation.

AARP conference

I am in the US lecturing at the AARP conference Health Care ´08 in Washington DC. The hosting organisation – the American Alliance for Retired People – is the largest member-based community in the world with 40 million members – a strong stakeholder in the US and also the international health policy development.

The “European Healthcare Model” (or, rather, the many different models) attracts now in election times significant attention among US policy formers, with advantages like reasonable costs, full coverage, more consistent systems and information integrity vis-a-vis the individual. A number of Europeans from the EU institutions as well as academia and private organisations are lecturing to a huge audience of US healthcare society leadership, keen to learn about the European mix of public-private partnership and value for money delivery.

Mutual learning and benchmarking is a part of the conference framework. The Powerhouse work attracts a lot of interest, referred to by the AARP CEO Bill Novelli and the EU ambassador to the US John Bruton in their introduction speeches. Open, consumer-focused comparisons will become a major instrument for change. To health care leaders who understand to communicate with consumers and stakeholders it will become a gift, to others it will be a curse. But the consumer demand for involvement and empowerment is here to stay and grow.

Johan Hjertqvist

President