May 2015
© EPF
NEW BOARD, NEW MEMBERS, NEW CAMPAIGN!
The EPF 2015 Annual General Meeting took place in Brussels on 19 May, just before our Patient Empowerment Conference and the launch of our Patient Empowerment Campaign. This was an opportunity for our members to meet, exchange, celebrate their involvement in the European Patients’ Movement and vote for the new EPF Board.
Annual General Meeting
During our 2014 AGM, EPF members had the opportunity to vote for the new EPF Board, where they showed their confidence in previous Board Members as well as their trust in new members. Among them was Pedro Montellano, President of the Global Alliance Of Mental Illness Advocacy Networks-Europe (GAMIAN-EUROPE) who sadly passed away this October. Pedro will be remembered as a passionate and enthusiastic advocate for mental health, but above all as a very warm and engaging person and real leader. We will miss him..
At the AGM , EPF welcomed the Flemish Patients Platform as an associate member. We now proudly represent the interests of 65 official members, who are either specific chronic disease groups working at EU level or are national coalitions of patients.
The AGM also approved the 2014 Annual Report which documents all our activities during the past year and also the 2015 Work Plan which outlined our focus of the next months.
Patient Empowerment Conference
Right after our AGM, on 20-21 May 2015, we gathered together over 150 patient leaders, health professionals, NGO representatives, researchers and policy-makers gathered to explore the role of patient empowerment in building high-quality equitable, sustainable health systems in Europe during our patient empowerment conference. The conference also marked the official launch of our one-year Patient Empowerment Campaign.
Conference speakers, both experts and patients, presented the evidence-base on patient empowerment and inspirational case studies. Participants discussed the challenges of making empowerment a reality for all patients and how it can be integrated into a future EU approach to measuring healthcare quality. Interactive workshops delved in-depth into three key aspects of empowerment: health literacy, shared decision-making, and self-management.
More information:
Contact: EPF Communications Assistant, Valentina Stylianou at valentina.stylianou@eu-patient.eu