From 21st to the 23rd of September 2022, the first meeting of the European Commission funded project PROPHET was held in Rome at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore (UCSC), the project coordinator as part of the Horizon Europe programme.
What is the goal of this European Project?
The Personalised Prevention Roadmap for the future healthcare, that will be co-created together with a large panel of stakeholders gathered in the PROPHET Stakeholder Forum, aims at supporting the definition and implementation of innovative, sustainable and high-quality personalised strategies that effectively chronic diseases.
Prevention is in fact a high priority at the European level: 900,000 people in EU countries die prematurely every year due to risk factors that can largely be prevented through a shift from the treatment of established diseases to a “person-centered” disease prevention and early diagnosis, where citizens and patients are equals and active partners in their care pathway.
What does personalised prevention mean?
According to the project's experts, "Personalised prevention aims to prevent the onset, progression and recurrence of disease through the adoption of targeted interventions that consider the biological information, environmental and behavioural characteristics, the socio-economic and cultural context of individuals. This should be timely, effective and equitable to maintain the best possible balance in lifetime health trajectory".
Why is this project relevant to you?
The project aims at engaging organisations and individuals to contribute to the construction of a Strategic Research Innovation Agenda (SRIA) to adopt Personalised Prevention approaches into EU health systems. Personalised prevention strategies are in fact only possible if citizens, health professionals and policy makers are all aware of their potential and have the knowledge and resources to design and implement them. Specific measures will therefore be developed to educate and empower the different targets and in particular the citizens of all ages and throughout their life, to play an active role in the self- management of their own health and self-care.
What is Cittadinanzattiva’s role in PROPHET?
Our role is to ensure that the knowledge base built by the project becomes available to citizens and patient associations at the Italian and European level (through Active Citizenship Network - ACN), and, through them, directly available to citizens and patients.
It is crucial to raise health literacy on the potential of personalized prevention to save lives and improve the quality of life of the general population.
The added value of civic and patient organizations is a comprehensive approach to empowering citizens and patients, which supports, informs and trains them to help them cope with the many difficulties of their daily lives. This comprehensive approach is needed to make citizens and patients strong enough to collaborate with their doctors in tailoring prevention and care plans, actively participating in managing their well-being and / or disease, and using health services more effectively.
Starting from the examples of education and involvement of patients, citizens and health professionals on aspects of prevention and personalized medicine collected and structured in the "Guidelines for the commitment of citizens, patients and health professionals in personalized prevention" and in the training materials available in the development of the "PROPHET online Toolbox" produced by the project, we will involve citizens and associations in:
- training experiences (online information sessions and capacity building activities);
- public events (for example in the context of the interest group of MEPs "Rights of European patients and cross-border healthcare" promoted by ACN).
- proximity information activities (open day: activists and experts will meet citizens to promote proximity information, distributing useful material and collecting reports to offer tools and support in Italy and in two other partner countries);
- information materials distributed through the main information and communication channels of the Project.
Who are the other project partners?
The PROPHET consortium is a multidisciplinary group of organisations across 12 Countries working on the different dimensions of Personalised Prevention that includes: Research organisations (Università Cattolica Del Sacro Cuore, Foundation For Genomics & Population Health, Consorcio Centro De Investigacion Biomedica En Red M.P., Stichting Vumc, University Of Debrecen, University Of Tartu, Universiteit Gent, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Karolinska Institutet), healthcare organisations (Fondazione Policlinico Universitario Agostino Gemelli Irccs), public authorities representing Research Funders and National Health Agencies (Instituto De Salud Carlos Iii, Instituto Nacional De Saude Dr. Ricardo Jorge, Finnish Institute for Health And Welfare), citizens and patients’ associations (Cittadinanzattiva APS and European Patients Forum), scientific society (European Public Health Association), European Research Infrastructure (European Molecular Biology Laboratory-ELIXIR and Biobanks And Biomolecular ResourcesResearch Infrastructure Consortium BBMRI-ERIC) and companies in innovation topics (Allelica SRL and G.A.C.).
Duration of the project:
4 years
Starting date: September 1, 2022
Finish date: August 31, 2026
Project Website:
www.prophetproject.eu
Contacts for further information:
Daniela Quaggia,
If you are interested in joining the PROPHET Forum as an expert, please contact Mario Masiello, PROPHET project manager, UCSC,
The European Commission funded PROPHET under the Horizon Europe research and innovation programme under Grant Agreement N°101057721 - cluster 1- destination 1: "Staying healthy in a rapidly changing society".
It is part of the International Consortium for Personalised Medicine (ICPerMed). Its results will feed the many other projects and initiatives of the ICPerMed family, as well as the highest policy levels.
