Cross-border health activities in the Euregios: Good practice for better health

Helmut Brand, Alfons Hollederer, Ulrike Wolf and Angela Brand

Health Policy, 2008, vol. 86, issue 2-3, pages 245-254

Abstract: Background Health-related cooperation between neighbouring countries has a long tradition in the European Union, especially in the transfrontier structures well-known under the label of Euregio or Euroregion.Objective Overview and analysis of cross-border health-related activities in the Euregios.Methods The EU-funded project "EUREGIO" carried out a systematic inventory analysis of cross-border health projects. It is based on written surveys among 53 Interreg IIIA secretariats, 67 Euregios and 328 project bodies. The responses of 122 health projects were considered.Results 37 Euregios or similar cross-border structures established health-relevant working groups, working circles, forums or projects. The cross-border health projects cover a wide spectrum of issues, e.g., education and training, patient care, prevention, and disaster control. Target groups were in most cases medical personnel, patients or decision-making bodies. Four official criteria for cooperation (joint project development, implementation, staffing and financing) are met by the great majority of projects. However, the survey shows a lack of information, publication and evaluation.Conclusions Cross-border cooperation in health is underrepresented in many regions. The project results point to great potentials which should be further developed both in terms of quantitative and qualitative aspects. Recommendations are given for project actors and stakeholders.

Date: 2008

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6V8X ... f2dc6cfeaf69efa8aff7
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:hepoli:v:86:y:2008:i:2-3:p:245-254

Access Statistics for this article

Health Policy is edited by Katrien Kesteloot, Mia Defever and Irina Cleemput

More articles in Health Policy from Elsevier
Series data maintained by Heidi Boesdal ().