Europe’s demographic changes lead to a growing incidence of age-related diseases, a growing demand for care and a real sustainability challenge for our social and health care systems. According to recent research, 80% of care in Europe is provided by families and friends. The same research shows that there are more than 100 million carers in Europe today – a figure that is probably underestimated given the recognition and (self-) recognition issue of carers.
The contribution of these informal carers clearly constitutes a great resource for our society, even if their role is not always recognised. Delivering a wide range of support services such as personal care, housekeeping, transportation, care and financial management as well as emotional support, carers often offer the most comprehensive and desirable option for people in need of care declared Stecy Yghemonos, Executive Director, Eurocarers.
RBS-Center fir Altersfroen is thus proud to announce the launch of a new web-platform for informal carers – InformCare – developed in the framework of the EU-funded Innovage project.
InformCare provides informal carers from 27 EU member states with key information on their rights and entitlements as well as advice on how to best deliver and cope with their caregiving activities. Care professionals and employers from a selection of countries, are also be able to access information on how to best support carers and meet their needs. The platform also offers a variety of interactive communication tools (such as a social network, a forum and a chat) to allow carers to interact, share tips and feelings, look for ideas and suggestions, ask for help, support others or just have a chat with someone who understands what being a carer means!
The development and dissemination of the InformCare web platform has been coordinated by the Italian National Institute of Health and Science on Aging (INRCA) (www.inrca.it) and Eurocarers, the European Association working for Carers (www.eurocarers.org). National organisations, essentially members of the Eurocarers network, have been responsible for collating and producing the national information as well as for disseminating the platform at national level.
Visit the InformCare web platform at www.eurocarers.org/InformCare
For more information on the Luxembourg version contact recherche@rbs.lu
WHAT IS INNOVAGE ALL ABOUT?
Innovage aims to develop and survey social innovations that will have an impact on the quality of life of older people and positively impact on their healthy life years. The project has four specific objectives:
1. To develop, implement and evaluate four potentially cost-effective social innovations focused on: social innovation, well-being and quality of life, and Healthy Life Expectancy.
2. To create a brand new social innovation web-based platform, consisting of model, state-of-the-art, innovations from anywhere in the world that have been evaluated to have real potential to contribute to extending Healthy Life Expectancy.
3. To tackle head-on the critical barriers to the implementation of social innovations in this field by drawing on state-of the-art research and experience in social innovation development and by adopting a novel approach based on the exploitation of recent technologies for addressing users’ needs in an optimal way.
4. To emphasise knowledge exchanges to and implementation especially in the New Member states. The tools for implementation will recognise the very unequal experience of Healthy Life Expectancy across Europe and seek to prioritise the New Member States and especially those in Central and Eastern Europe.