Activities

WHO Nursing and Midwifery Collaborating Center Meeting Copenhagen February 1-2 2023

Jürgen Osterbrink and Manela Glarcher attended a meeting of European WHO CCs at the UN City in Copenhagen in early February. Participants from 15 European countries met to discuss ways to reorient healthcare in Europe after a two-year COVID break. This included specific objectives in nursing that must be achieved by 2030 in order to ensure high-quality and safe care for patients in future as well. The WHO CC in Salzburg has existed since 2016 and is the only one with a focus in nursing sience and practice in the German-speaking region.

During the meeting, various past but also future activities to strenghen healthcare were presented and discussed by the partitipants. The Institute of Nursing Science and Practice at the Paracelsus Medical University in Salzburg was designated to WHO Collaborating Centre for Nursing Research and Education in 2016. The re-designation for the second term followed in 2020. During this period, the WHO Regional Office in Europe and Paracelsus Medical University (PMU) in Salzburg have made an agreement to strengthen palliative care across the region. Following targets of references (TORs) and activities were set for years 2020-2024:

TOR 1 to strengthen palliative care education and training:

Evidence confirms that training and education in palliative care empowers healthcare professionals to manage daily challenges and provide better and secure care.

TOR 2 to strengthen nurse-led palliative care, through collecting, collating and dissem-inating evidence on palliative care in outpatient care and long-term care facilities:

WHO will utilize the deliverables to strengthen the development of a sustainable nursing workforce engaged in palliative care, and reduce staff turnover and vacancy rates due to challenges related to preparedness and distress in the palliative care field.

TOR 3 to assist WHO in dissemination of evidence and information regarding digital innovations in integrated palliative care

WHO will utilize this deliverable to support the application of telehealth technologies to palliative care (tele-palliative care), and thereby seek to address challenges of geo-graphical and social isolation, burden of travelling, healthcare workers and clinicians’ understaffing, transnational caregiving, and the timely assessment and management of symptoms.

Our centre built up international expertise in 2022 through activities in the fields of RESEARCH, EDUCATION and TRAINING. We were able to publish open access publications and held international conference presentations.

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