Action grants supporting training activities, implementation, and best practices

EXPECTED RESULTS AND IMPACT

The support of capacity building is expected to enhance primary and secondary healthcare services.

An improved effectiveness of healthcare systems to prevent infection is likely to result in reductions in healthcare associated infections and improvements in patient safety in relation to AMR in the participating hospitals and long-term care facilities.

SPECIFIC MANDATORY DELIVERABLES AND/OR TOPIC

Developed best practice and considerations/plan for its wider uptake (e.g. pilot accompanied by a replication plan) and developed trainings.

- Dissemination Plan and Report;

- Evaluation Plan and Report.

SPECIFIC ACTION-LEVEL INDICATORS FOR REPORTING PURPOSES

Applicants will include the following specific action-level indicators and related reporting activities in their proposals:

Capacity building activities

- Number of training courses organized - implementation

- Number of specialists trained - output

- Satisfaction rate of trainees - direct result

- Number of trainees having introduced new practice at work after the training (to be considered when the N. of trainees is limited) - indirect result

Best practices

- Number of structures involved (hospitals, long-term care facilities…) - implementation

- Number of best practice case studies developed - output

- Number of outreach events organised - output

- Number of structures declaring to have introduced best practices - result.

POLICY CONTEXT

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) – the ability of microorganisms to resist antimicrobial treatments, especially antibiotics – has a direct impact on human and animal health and carries a heavy economic burden due to higher costs of treatments and reduced productivity caused by sickness. AMR is responsible for an estimated 33 000 deaths per year in the Union. It is also estimated that AMR costs in the Union amount to €1.5 billion per year in healthcare and productivity losses.

In June 2017, the Commission adopted the EU One Health Action Plan against AMR. With its holistic view on the issue, recognising the link between human and animal health and the role of the environment, it has three key objectives: making the Union a best practice region, boosting research development and innovation and shaping the global agenda. As part of the first objective, the plan pursues a better prevention and control of AMR, among other things, by strengthening infection prevention and control measures. As indicated in the plan, the Commission will help to address patient safety in hospitals and long term care facilities by supporting good practices in infection prevention and control.

The mission letter to Commissioner Stella Kyriakides defines the need to tackle the rise or return of highly infectious diseases, highlighting the need to focus on the full implementation of the EU One Health Action Plan against AMR in order to work with international partners to advocate for a global agreement on the use of and access to antimicrobials.

The action supports the policy priority to prevent and control the rise or return of highly infectious diseases. It implements the EU4Health Programme’s general objective of protecting people in the Union from serious cross-border threats to health and strengthening the responsiveness of health systems and coordination among the Member States in order to cope with serious cross-border threats to health (Article 3, point (b)) through the specific objectives defined in Article 4, points (a), (b) and (i) of Regulation (EU) 2021/522.

OBJECTIVES
This action aims to support enhanced hospital and long-term care facilities infection prevention and control practices, as well as antimicrobial stewardship practices, and the development of best practices and implementation at all levels. It supports the commitment in the EU One Health Action Plan against AMR for the Commission to help to address patient safety in hospitals by supporting good practices in infection prevention and control and antimicrobial stewardship.

DESCRIPTION OF THE ACTIVITIES TO BE FUNDED UNDER THIS TOPIC

The activities will focus on capacity building, by providing training and implementation of enhanced infection prevention and control (IPC) practices and antimicrobial stewardship (AMS) in hospitals and in long-term care facilities and support for further dissemination, as well as AMS in primary care.

They shall include training as well as other activities to support good practice in IPC, and AMS including clinical audit and feedback, action by regulators (e.g. incentive schemes, sanction schemes), pilots to showcase state-of-the-art IPC and AMS schemes in hospitals and long term facilities that can be replicated elsewhere using for instance the Cohesion Policy funds in the future (e.g. for investments into healthcare infrastructure).