transnational meeting 3
February 2020
Brussels, Belgium
Minutes Learn4Carers 3rd transnational project meeting (TPM) GoToMeeting
Learn4Carers 3rdd transnational project meeting (TPM) took place by teleconference on the 23 and 24th March 2020, and was coordinated by Eurocarers , who are a partner on the Learn4Carers project. We used the platform GoToMeeting: https://www.gotomeet.me/Eurocarers/l4c-3rd-transnational-meeting—session-1
DATE: 23rd March 2020, 14:30 – 16:30 and 24th March 2020, 14:30 – 16:30
The Learn4Carers Project promotes the exchange of good practices for caregivers. It includes five partners coming from four different countries: Greece, Belgium, France and Ireland. In addition, associated partners from Greece, UK, Italy, Belgium and Turkey. Learn4Carersisis the abbreviation of “Learning for Caregivers in Europe” and the Project ID is: 2018-1-EL01-KA204-047837. Due to the COVID-19 situation the transnational project meeting has the form of a teleconference. Spyros Zorbas presented the Learn4Carers Gantt Chart.
23.3.2020 – 1st Day
Welcome
The meeting was chaired by Stecy Yggemonos, Executive Director Eurocarers and Spyros Zorbas, President of Greek Carers Network, EPIONI.
Spyros Zorbas welcomed each of the participants and kicked off the meeting.
After the welcome speeches, each of the project partners made presentations/updates about the work of their organisation, the state of play with respect to family carers in their respective countries and their strategy in relation to the implementation of the project.
Partner Updates
Care Alliance Ireland
Mr Liam O’Sullivan mentioned that they understand that many family carers in Ireland are anxious about the current outbreak of the Covid-19 virus. This outbreak has been upgraded, worldwide, to a pandemic by the World Health Organization.In Care Alliance, they are not in a position to give medical advice and would recommend that all family carers follow the recommendations of the Irish Government (http://bit.ly/GOVCovid19) and the HSE (http://bit.ly/38UPhP1) on such matters. As this is such a rapidly evolving situation, they created a page of advice which will change on a regular basis. Their page specifically set up, detailing the measures that family carers should be aware of in relation to Covid-19: https://familycarers.ie/coronavirus-covid-19-information-advice/. https://www.carealliance.ie/Covid19
Care Alliance Ireland in addition to their regular submissions, newsletters, discussion documents and briefing papers, they receive financial support from the Department of Rural and Community Development and to a lesser extent the HSE.
In recent months their Environmental Sustainability Policy was approved, whilst several other policies were reviewed and updated. They did not apply for the Good Governance awards this year, instead, they focused on supporting some of their smaller member organisations to improve their own governance. They will continue to actively monitor, engage with and support the HSE, the Charities Regulator and Pobal, in pursuit of higher quality public sector processes, online services and overall accountability. In 2020 they will continue to agitate for better services, more transparent operations, stronger collaborations, a new/refreshed National Carers Strategy and an increasing recognition that Ireland’s family carers and the organisations that support them are central to a caring society.
La Compagnie des Aidants
The association “La compagnie des aidants” is based in Paris ( 54 rue Molière – 94200 Ivry-sur-Seine – Tél : 01 76 28 40 81 email : ckulak@lacompagniedesaidants.org – www.lacompagniedesaidants.org
Ms.Céline Martinez gave a brief update on the work of La Compagnie des Aidants She highlighted the use of a bus/campervan to raise awareness of family carers in France.
“La Compagnie des Aidant” in 2019 :
Creation of a guide on technical aids for the Val-de-Marne department : in this document, advice on technical aids per room in the home and presentation of financial solutions. In addition to this document, we have created a virtual house with some technical aids and a poster placed in the reception places in
the department.
Creation of a newsletter for carers living in the Hauts-de-Seine department : In this newsletter, carers can find articles giving advice, a list of useful addresses near their homes and videos that we have made to illustrate the places where carers are received.
They organized awareness actions with professionals, companies on the role of caregivers : some public structures ask us to present our solutions for caregivers
Creation of an employee-caregiver conference with HR and managers : the conference was made up of a presentation of employee-caregivers and scenario workshops.
They participated in the development of the government action plan for caregivers : they attended brainstorming meetings on creating the action plan Carers caravan set up in 10 cities in France : during this caravan, they stayed for 3 days in a public space with local social workers to inform the carers. in addition to caravans, they organized round tables in hospitals which bring together healthcare professionals, patient associations, caregivers around a table to discuss the role of the caregiver in the care process
They are members of the collective Je t’ Aide which organizes the national carers day (6.10).
They have developed the functions of their website: access to the general public for the used equipment exchange, creation of the standard mail tab, creation of the online training platform with 13 tutorial videos
“La Compagnie des Aidants” in 2020
They Organize awareness actions with professionals, companies on the role of caregivers : some public structures ask us to present our solutions for caregivers. They carry out awareness-raising actions with patient associations to raise awareness on the subject of caregivers. They are responding to an Erasmus “Support to Care” call for the projects : co-creation of training tools for carers with different European countries.
Greek Carers Network EPIONI (www.epioni.gr)
Mr. Fokion Dimitriadis shared the current Erasmus+ projects for EPIONI (ECARIS, Linking Partners and Share4Brain). Mr. Dimitriadis emphasised that EPIONI is active in the advocacy of Greek family carers.
They advocate for the implementation of the EU directive at the minister of Health and the minister of Labour with a memo that a prestigious lawyer prepared for EPIONI.
Mr. Dimitriadis mentioned that due to the Covid-19 pandemic EPIONI postponed the organizing of the Information Day for Relatives of People with Depression and Psychosis at the Public Psychiatric Hospital of Dafni scheduled for 2.4.2020.
Mr. Dimitriadis highlighted the upcoming EPIONI conference focusing on caregivers in Greece, which is being held under the auspices of the Ministry of Health in Greece the 28-29.9.2020
EPIONI on Saturday, May 9, 2020, at 10:30 am, in cooperation with the organizations “Heart of the Child”, “Scitali” and the Enosi Kardiopathon Axiomatikon Polemikou Naftikou” organizes a webinar on Supporting people with heart disease and their carers. Registration: https://forms.gle/9zSvBFUgosFDqyZS7
Mr. Zorbas suggested to Stecy and the partners to attend – participate in the framework of Learn4Carers. According to the project proposal we will deliver a webinar for carers – June 2020.
Eurocarers
Mr Stecy Yghemonos gave a brief update on Eurocarers work and the current priorities of the organisation within relevant EU institutions and stakeholders. Eurocarers is preparing a toolkit composed of practical information and tips targeted at carers who are in the first line to deal with coronavirus. The toolkit will be made public on the 24th March and will be accompanied by a press release.
Learn4Carers partners are invited to disseminate and adapt it to their own needs (i.e. translate, amend, elaborate on it as required) Regarding the general project and advocacy activities of Eurocarers, Stecy mentioned that:
A meeting with the Croatian EC Vice President in charge of Democracy and Demography Ms. Dubravka Šuica will take place as soon as the coronavirus crisis is over. Ms. Šuica’s cabinet is indeed working on a “Green Paper on ageing” to be released in the last quarter of the year. The paper will focus on the impact of demographic ageing in European on various population groups as well as on ways of adapting social protection to meet the evolving needs of the population.
The meeting between the Vice-President’s cabinet and Eurocarers will serve to highlight the need to support informal carers and promote the EU Strategy on Carers. (https://ec.europa.eu/commission/commissioners/2019-2024/suica_en) Stecy also underlined Eurocarers’ involvement in a collaboration with the EC on the development of a new report on Long-Term Care. This process, led by DG Employment and social affairs, involves all of the member states and the objective is to capture formal and informal care as two sides of the same coin. Stecy indeed added that the EC seems to have adopted a new approach regarding informal care. In the past, it was approaching formal and informal care as mutually exclusive, now they recognise the need to see Informal Care as an integral part of care systems. https://ec.europa.eu/social/main.jsp?catId=792&langId=en In the report, Long-term care (LTC) is defined as a range of services and assistance for people who, as a result of mental and/or physical frailty and/or disability over an extended period of time, depend on help with daily living activities and/or are in need of some permanent nursing care. The daily living activities for which help is needed may be the self-care activities that a person must perform every day (Activities of
Daily Living, or ADLs, such as bathing, dressing, eating, getting in and out of bed or a chair, moving around, using the toilet, and controlling bladder and bowel functions) or may be related to independent living (Instrumental Activities of Daily Living, or IADLs, such as preparing meals, managing money, shopping for groceries or personal items, performing light or heavy housework, and using a telephone). Stecy emphasised Eurocarers’ ongoing contribution to a future report by EuroFound on access to care services. He also drew the attention of partners to the end of the
Edy-Care project and the availability of the project’s deliverables on the Eurocarers website. Edy-Care aims to tools to empower teachers and other school staff in upper secondary education to recognise adolescent young carers (16-19 years old) in classes and maximize their learning opportunities, while ensuring their social inclusion.
Finally, Stecy also informed partners about recent positive policy developments in a series of member states, including: Estonia, where the government has initiated a policy dialogue on informal care and is trying to establish a partnership agreement with an organisation
representing them;
Lithuania: where a new law proposal has been developed regarding informal carers;
Slovenia: the government has announced the development of a reform package in the field of Long-Term Care (with an apparent willingness to somehow capture informal care).
PEPSAEE
Mr. Nikos Drosos gave an update on the work of PEPSAEE, highlighting that their work for people with psychosocial problems is affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.
Mr. Drosos highlighted a very successful workshop in Athens, discussing legal and other issues important for caregivers of people with mental health problems.
Additionally, PEPSAEE organized two other events in the first months of 2020 regarding mental health service users’ rights and social security issues.
Mr. Drosos stated that PEPSAEE raises awareness of events, art festivals, etc. for mental health patients and their families.
The currently run the following EU projects:
http://www.art4psy.eu/el-gr/HOME
https://www.facebook.com/groups/917444808623525/
Update on Project Outputs
Mr. Zormbas updated the group on the outputs of the project to-date, such as the continued updates to the learn4carers.eu, the good practices guide and the project newsletter.
Mr. Ygemonos and Mrs Zorbas updated the group briefly on the status of the learn4carers.eu website.
Online Good Practice Guide – Content Generation
Mr. Spyridon Zormpas gave an update to the group about the online good practice and content generation. The website,the good practice guide.
Project Newsletter
Mr. Zormpas informed that partners could send to PEPSAEE the content to create the May 2020 project newsletter. The newsletter details updates, news and project progress to a wider audience and highlights future meetings between the partners.
Leaflet
Mr. Zormpas informed that the the leaflet, available in three languages, Greek, English and French is uploaded in the www.learn4carers.eu
Financials
Mr. Zormpas informed that the mid-term report to IKY (Greek National Agency) was submitted in October 2019, and that the final 20% payment will be done in 2021. The project group is reminded to keep all receipts for the meeting which was cancelled. A discussion followed.
Website
Stecy and Spyros had a short discussion on the learn4carers.eu website. Primary focus of the discussion was on the Good Practices section, which is available for users to enter information about good practices related to family carers.
Next Partner meeting
Next Teleconference to be organized 12th of May 2020 at 11:00 CET-
Zoom call, to be arranged by Care Alliance Ireland, for May 12th 2020. 1 Hour duration. 12pm Greece/ 10 pm Ireland/ 11 pm Belgium. Care Alliance Ireland will send out invitations for Zoom meeting to Learn4Carers partners in due course.
Next Webinar 8.5.2020
Evaluation (PEPSAEE)
Mr. Drosos gave a brief update on the evaluation of the project, and how this will be done.
Mr. Drosos mentioned that PEPSAEE and partners will monitor the progress and evaluate the impact of the project by:
Measuring whether and to what extent the aims and objectives of the project are being met
Whether the project is on track to deliver planned activities and outputs
Whether any corrective action needs to be taken
The impact of the project at a local, regional, national and EU level
The mid-term process evaluation aims to verify if the project has achieved its established objectives. Such criteria being measured is outputs of the project, adherence to timescale, quality of project and financial management. As a result of the evaluation, modifications to the work plan will be proposed.
Mr. Drosos highlighted the Quality Assurance manual to the group and worked through the document, with a specific emphasis on the appendices where checklists, evaluation forms etc. can be used to evaluate the project to date.
Zoom call, to be arranged by Care Alliance Ireland, for 25th November 2019. 1 Hour duration. 12pm Greece/ 10 pm Ireland/ 11 pm Belgium. Care Alliance Ireland will send out invitations for Zoom meeting to Learn4Carers partners in due course.
Presentation on EPALE –
Mr. Zormpas, gave a short on-line presentation on how to make posts to EPALE.
He contacted Mrs Christina Makri from the Greek National Agency epale@iky.gr
EPALE is for adult learners, by adult learners ‘Adult Educators for Adult Education’
The EPALE website is now faster, after migrating servers to a cloud-based service
This allows for faster login and overall faster connectivity
If a user or organisation, who has an active account on EPALE, wishes to put more information on the website, then they can do it themselves or they can send the information to their National Service Provider. For example, in Greece, this is IKY epale@iky.gr.
EPALE has functionality for news, blogs and event details for organisations.
EPALE also has Theme functionality, which allows for various topics to be entered into specific themes.
For example, caregivers may be entered under the theme of social inclusion, health literacy or community learning etc.
Decisions/Agreed Actions
Zoom Meeting for 12th May (10:00 Ireland/Scotland, 11:00 Belgium, 12:00 Greece), arranged by Care Alliance Ireland
Adding Table of Strategy to the Good Practice Guide decided – “Supporting Informal Carers in Europe: Good Practice for Family Caregivers”
Sending the certificates of attendance – Evaluations
Translating the Good Practice guide to Greek and French.
DAY 2 – Learn4Carers 3rd Transnational Meeting / Tuesday, 24 March 2020, 14:30 – 16:30 (CET)
We Joined the conference using our computer:
https://www.gotomeet.me/Eurocarers/l4c-3rd-transnational-meeting—session-2
The focus group: Implementing a holistic Carers Strategy across the EU – State of play took place
The introduction was given by Stecy Yghemonos, Eurocarers
There was a discussion about remaining challenges for caregivers.
Measures targeted at young carers
Olivier Jacqmain presented the co-designed support measure to empower young carers, including the “Me-We” booklet
Ciara O’Dwyer, Eurocarers presented the ICT-based solutions for care and caring
Alhassan Hassan, INRCA-IRCCS, UNIVPM (Italy) presented the existing ICT-based solutions for carers in Europe and challenges to be addressed.
Finally two case studies – learning from the Erasmus+ projects TRACK and CARE4DEM were discussed by Claire Champeix, Eurocarers
End of the 2nd Transnational Project Meeting