New roles, new skills

New roles and new skills for health professionals

The deep changes in the medical and demographic structure of population, in the social, economic and technological environment, as well as the increasing patients’ needs and citizens’ expectations affect the ability of EU healthcare systems to give proper and prompt answers. Each country can face these challenges in a different way, and its decisions clearly have a strong impact on healthcare professionals’ activities.

In this environment, HOPE selected “New roles and new skills for health professionals” as the topic for its HOPE Exchange Programme 2009, a 4-week training programme during which hospital and health care professionals with management responsibilities work in a foreign country on a specific topic. At the end of the training, participants gathered by country of destination prepare a presentation concerning what they have learnt about their hosting countries. During a final conference, the group presentations are discussed and three of them are awarded.

The document “New roles, new skills” presents the main findings of the conference 2009, where participants illustrated through several practical examples how changes in the healthcare systems affect healthcare professionals’ working pathways and presented the new emerging roles and skills in EU countries.

The main findings of the conference include some common tendencies in the hospital organisation of EU Member States but above all three important trends regarding hospital professionals: the development of new roles, with new tasks related to new positions; the rise in new skills, mainly related to managerial abilities and ICT competencies, and ‘skills transfer’, concerning the shift of tasks and responsibilities from higher to lower professional levels.

Results of the HOPE Exchange programme 2009 "New roles, new skills"

More information about the HOPE Exchange Programme 2009 “New roles and new skills for health professionals” as well as the awarded presentations are available at
Exchange programme 2009

Activities

Hospitals in the 27
EU Member States

Quality of care

Human resources
Professional mobility
Social dialogue
Working time
New roles, new skills

Public health

Hospital, health care
and internal market

e-Health

Cross-border
co-operation

Green hospitals

Networking