EFA

In care related news this month, new guidelines on atopic eczema have been published and a big capacity building project for patients on clinical trials has been launched. New guidelines on Atopic Eczema published The European Academy of Dermatology and Venereology (EADV) has published new guidelines on managing Atopic Eczema (AE). EADV is an organisation that aims to advance research, education, training and the standards of clinical care in the field of dermatology and Venereology, as well as to educate patients with skin (cutaneous) or sexually transmitted (venereal) diseases. EFA was consulted on the guidelines, which are very patient centered and include very practical advice. The guidelines have been published in the Journal of the European Academy of Dermatology and Venereology. EFA has requested that they will be fully accessible to the public soon. More information and abstracts of the guidelines can be viewed here: abstract I  abstract II. EFA attends kick-off meeting of new EU Patients’ Academy on Therapeutic Innovation EFA board member Lina Buzermaniene attended the first meeting of the project EU Patients’ Academy on Therapeutic Innovation, known as EUPATI, held in Frankfurt on the 5^th of September this year. The aim of EUPATI is to provide patients, their representatives and the lay public with scientifically reliable, objective and comprehensive information on medicinal research by developing educational material, training courses and a public internet library. In this way it hopes to empower patients to become effective experts and advisers in medical research themselves, and encourage their needs and insights to be placed at its centre. The kick-off meeting was attended by more than 120 participants from 24 countries, demonstrating EU patients’ interest in gaining knowledge in the area and their often overlooked need to better understand the complicated regulation procedures that surround it. Though this was the first major EUPATI gathering, the project began 8 months ago, and has already begun to deliver results. The workshop was designed to discuss these as well as to develop future ideas. It focused on 4 themes: raising awareness of EUPATI; developing national platforms to connect participating networks; improving the collection of information; and the best way of deliver results. EUPATI is coordinated by the European Patients' Forum (EPF) and funded by the Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI), Europe's largest public-private initiative aiming to speed up the development of better and safer medicines for patients. It plans to produce educational material in seven European languages targeting twelve European countries. For more information contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.