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Newsletter 5

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Editorial Welcome to the 5th M-CARE Newsletter.

It covers the activities realized within the framework of the M-

CARE project in the period May - September 2015. Although it was a summer period M-CARE Partners remained active undertaking all

planned actions such as dissemination, piloting and refining the project materials content.

In the first section you can find a brief overview of piloting in some

Partners’ countries. Within this issue you can also read an interview with Filiz Can, a famous Turkish university professor, who

is dealing with physiotherapy.

We also present the most successful dissemination activities realized during the mentioned period, as well as introduce our final

dissemination event of M-CARE project “Caring for people with dis-abilities and older people: challenges, opportunities and

online) training solutions” that will be held on 1 December 2015 in Brussels, Belgium. The registration is now open. Attendance is free

but registration is obligatory, and is possible via an online form. Any other costs incurred in participating to this event (hotel,

travel, subsistence, etc.) must be paid for by the attendee.

More details about the pilot phase in each country as well as impressions and quotations by the participants will be available in

the last issue of the Newsletter.

We wish you a pleasant reading and in case you want to contact

the editor’s team, please use interprojectsbg@gmail.com.

M-CARE PILOTING PHASE

Interpojects team is leading the piloting of M-CARE and developed a Pilot plan to ensure that all partners run this crucial phase of the

project correctly and consistently, applying similar approaches across all pilot countries (Belgium, Bulgaria, Germany, Turkey).

The recruitment of the participants started over the spring of 2015. Huge interest towards the training was expressed by man-

agers of elderly care agencies from the private sector as well as by public administration experts who manage the national pro-

grammes for personal and social assistants of people with disabili-ties.

Piloting in Turkey

Gazi University initiated the piloting in April 2015. They identified

30 piloters and 2 trainers for the piloting process. Fifteen of the piloters are working with elderly people and the rest are working

with people with disabilities. The recruitment of the piloters was completed on 31 March 2015. They all completed the pre-

assessment and are still continuing their training. Piloting in Bulgaria

Interpojects reached more than 20 PCGs, who took part in face-to-face induction training. It was a half-day event where M-CARE e-

learning platform and the mobile application were demonstrated alongside with their functionalities. At the end of the presentation

the participants asked many questions about the format of the training as this proved to be quite innovative and unfamiliar for

them. The trainers gave detailed explanations about the training scheme and asked the participants to give their consent for partic-

ipation in M-CARE piloting. At the time being we may say that af-

ter several months of training the number of piloters varied only lightly with few participants withdrawing and others joining the

course as they do need training in order to join the national pro-grammes for personal and social assistants of people with disabil-

ities.

M-CARE testing in Bulgaria is now in its most intensive phase and

in the last issue of the Newsletter the readers will find quotations,

impressions and conclusions from the testing phase.

At present all modules have been well received, but suggestions

for additional content have been made (e.g. include handling of a

wheelchair by the personal caregiver) and will be incorporated in

the final versions.

INTERVIEW with FILIZ CAN

Who is Prof. Dr. Filiz Can?

Filiz Can graduated from Hacettepe University School of Physical Therapy and Rehabilitation

(Turkey) in 1982. She has worked as a physio-therapist at Hacettepe University Physical Medi-

cine and Rehabilitation Department. She re-ceived the title of Associated Prof. in 1992 and

Prof. in 2003. She has finished many certificated courses about different techniques in orthopae-

dic manual therapy, geriatrics, taping, back pain and orthopaedic rehabilitation. She has been to

the USA for clinical visits in different rehabilitation centres, hospi-

tals and nursing homes for 1.5 months. She was in France at ‘Centre De Traumatologic et D' Orthopedie Fonctionelle’ and ‘Centre De Readaptation Fonctionelle Clemenceau’ hospitals as fel-low in 1994. She was in Netherlands - Enschede Saxion University

in 2005 as a project manager and visitor academic staff. She is the previous president of the International Association of Physio-

therapist Working with Older People. She is still a member of Administrative Board and a delegate of Turkey at the same

association.

Can you say something about The Association of Interna-

tional Physical Therapists Working with Older People?

The WCPT is a confederation of 106 national physical therapy associations representing more than 350.000 physical therapists

around the world. It was founded in 1951. WCPT aims to improve global health by representing physical therapy internationally and

encouraging high standards of physical therapy research, educa-

tion and practice. Subgroups are international physical therapy organizations

recognized by WCPT member organizations established to exchange scientific knowledge and promote the advancement of

physical therapy in a special area of interest; IPTOP was recognized as a subgroup of the WCPT in 2003.

What are the organizational goals of IPTOP?

IPTOP represents national special interest groups of physical

therapists working with elderly people. The efforts of the association are directed towards enabling national organizations

and their individual members to work with older people through research, evidence based practice, clinical specialization and

collaborative practice with other disciplines and careers. The in-

tention of the association is: to be the international resource for physical therapists

working with older people;

To foster collaboration between physical therapists working with elderly people throughout the world;

To encourage high standards of physical therapy practice with older people;

To advance practice by communicating and exchanging rele-vant information;

To encourage scientific research and promote

opportunities for the spread of knowledge of new developments in the field;

To assist WCPT member organisations in the formation and development of recognized groups working with

older people.

How does the physiotherapist contribute to the care of el-derly in all over the world?

The role of the physiotherapist in elderly care in the world is enormous. Physiotherapists work in geriatric wards and clinics for

the elderly, the elderly care centres, elderly rehabilitation centres, nursing homes, day care in nursing homes, physiotherapy and

rehabilitation services for the elderly services are data centres and old clubs for geriatrics. They determine the devices that the elder-

ly need such as wheelchairs, canes, crutches, corsets and shoes.

They also took part in the home care programmes as one of the most important member of home care service professionals.

Physiotherapist performs the education of the health care providers (health care professional or family member). They also

organize the certification and training programmes of the elderly care professionals. Physiotherapists have been started to work in

preventive health care services and preventive rehabilitation services after the report of the World Health Organization and

United Nations. Physiotherapists play a key role in preventing chronic diseases. They take part especially in national and

international projects about physical activity and healthy aging.

Are there any new strategies developed in Turkey and internationally about the elderly population? Could you, as

a previous chairman and a present Turkish representative

of IPTOP provide any details? ‘International Action Plan’ is the most important Project in the world which was put forward by the United Nations in the second World Assembly (8-12 April 2002) in Madrid, Spain. Many coun-

tries, including Turkey, signed this action plan that includes im-proving the quality of elderly people’s life, finding a solution to health and care problems of elderly, providing social integration, and regulating the socio-economic status. Many countriesalso

started working on the national regulation in the frame of this ac-tion plan. Turkey started to work on this issue in April 2004 with

the coordination of the State Planning Organization and Social Services and Child Protection Agency. Many other agencies and

NGOs were also included into the project.

The Association of the Physiotherapists Working with Geriatrics

took part in this Project by working in three commissions. This Project finished in 2005. The Report of the Project was printed as

a book entitled “State of the elderly people and National Action Plan of Aging” edited by The Association of the Physiotherapists Working with Geriatrics. The strategies determined by this action plan were accepted by The Ministry of Health and The Ministry of

Family and Social Policies.

The activities are mainly directed towards standardization of el-derly home care, preparation of a family knowledge system, plan-

ning of services to be offered to elderly people, development of advisory services for the elderly, prevention of chronic illness, cre-

ation of elderly employment, ensuring the continuity of services provided to the elderly and preventing elderly abuse.

The most important elements are the structures that permit the aging at home. For proper functioning of this structuring new

strategies including tele-rehabilitation, tele-care support, robot systems in elderly care, smart beds and smart homes have to be

implemented.

The increase in the elderly population, even in large countries, be-comes a problem due to the increase in health costs and removes

the sustainability of the personal care provided for the elderly. For this reason all the countries started to improve their health care

prevention programmes, to decrease health expenditures that in-crease by aging. For this reason active aging and physical activity

became an important strategy. These projects or Works are sup-ported or developed by physiotherapist with the support by all the

countries.

Finally, M-Care Project is developed to support the

individuals who take care of elderly and disabled people. What is the attitude of the association, where you

performed the Chairmanship in the past, towards the national and international projects?

Projects like M-Care, and similar initiatives in America, Canada and Australia generate reports that are taken into account by the

politicians. Regarding the rights of the elderly people all health care professionals’ duties, powers and responsibilities are deter-mined by the law. In some developing countries in Europe (Bulgaria, Romania, Estonia, Lithuania) restructuring on this issue

is still insufficient or not standardized as in our country.

Therefore the EU Health Commission or the relevant departments

of the United Nations stimulate the development of projects like M-Care.

The “International Physiotherapist Working with Older People As-sociation” was founded in 2003 and the priorities of the associa-tion are towards bringing together and improving the awareness

of the physiotherapist about the elderly and specialization of the physiotherapists on this subject.

In the general meeting of the IPTOP association held in Boston in

2013, it was decided that a "Research and Project Commission" would be established and the responsibility of this commission was

given to me. This commission developed a questionnaire and sent it to the member countries to get data. Some project proposals

have been developed based on the feedback received from these data.

M-CARE dissemination events EVBB's Annual Conference EVBB as one of the partners in M-Care and one of the largest

networks of VET providers in Europe is working closely together with different institutions within the European Commission. This

year's EVBB's Annual Conference under the patronage of the

European Parliament will be held in Brussels from 21st to the 24th October, 2015. Among the more than 100 registered participants

and guests will be high-ranking representatives of the European Parliament and European Commission beside many experts in the

field of Vocational Education and Training to worship the motto of the conference "Training and Skills for Employment and

Development". A major event will be the presentation of all projects EVBB is involved in on the 24th October 2015. Martin

Nieher (CDJ/EVBB) will present the state of the art report of M-Care and will invite the experts present to become active users of

the results. Hopefully, it will inspire people to become actively in-volved in the implementation process. They will also spread the M-

Care message within the EVBB network and among their partners.

Turkish dissemination events

Within the last four months the Project Coordinator University of Gazi realized a number of promotional activities that dissemi-

nated the M-CARE progress on Turkish and international level:

Presentation of a paper from the data of the M-Care Project (Stakeholders Views On Training Personal Caregivers: A

Transnational Study) at the International Health Manegement Conference, June 15-17, 2015 - Gümüşhane/Turkey. This

study won the best study award.

Presentation of the M-Care project at the International Health Manegement Conference, June 15-17, 2015 - Gümüşhane/Turkey.

Presentation of a paper from the data of the M-Care Project

(Investigation of the Profiles of Personal Caregivers of the Disabled and the Elderly in Europe) at the 5th National

Physiotherapy and Rehabilitation Congres, 20-24 May 2015 in Bolu/Turkey.

Prof. Seyhan FIRAT presented the project within a conference

about ‘Good practices about European Centralised projects’

M-CARE promoted during the 6th EUFAMI Congress

On 19th and 20th September 2015 The European Federation of

Associations of families of People with mental Illness (EUFAMI)

held its 6th congress in Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria. The event,

entitled “When East meets West – Families at the heart of Eu-

rope”, was visited by more than 100 participants from Bulgaria, Belgium, the UK, Ireland, Spain, Israel, France, Portugal and other

European and non-European countries. Among the participants

were the representatives of Interprojects team who took the op-

portunity to promote M-CARE project. The topics discussed within

the conference were directly linked with the personal care of

people with disabilities, with emphasis on mental health issues.

The event started with an opening speech by Bert Johnson, the

President of EUFAMI, who shared that this event is held every four

years and this time the participants would have a unique oppor-

tunity to establish direct contacts with the practitioners all over

Europe and even beyond. The speech was followed by couple of

presentations that highlighted the importance of psycho-social re-

habilitation, as well as the development of community based ser-

vices which ensure autonomous and dignified life of people with

disabilities. After the plenary session the participants were split in

five concurrent workshops where they shared their experience and

case studies on topics related to rehabilitation and care. Interpro-

jects’ team attended the dedicated workshop on “Caring for car-ers” and presented briefly the M-CARE training platforms. The par-

ticipants were impressed by the vast resources included in the

training modules. The official speakers pointed out that in a recent

research conducted by EUFAMI the data shows that burnout and

daily stress are the factors that badly affect the PCG’s work. The respondents in the presented research revealed that if they re-

ceived qualitative and timely training, they would offer their care

recipients services of a better quality. On the 2nd day of the

event the delegates had the opportunity to hear the testimonials

of people with disabilities themselves as well as by the profession-

als who shared their experience in coping with disabilities and

their limitations. The organizers allocated a special place where

the participants could display their leaflets to disseminate the the-

matically related projects or initiatives. M-CARE grasped the par-

ticipants’ interest and some experts asked for invitations to attend the final dissemination event in Brussels. Among them were uni-

versity professors, care providers, members of umbrella organisa-

tions, parents and relatives of people with disabilities.

The 2-day congress was a very successful dissemination event on

a transnational level where M-CARE project was well-received.

Planned Dissemination Events

M-Care Partners to present the mobile app's gamification

features at ITAG 2015

A paper authored by University of Athens and PhoenixKM, entitled

«Gamified mobile/online learning for personal care givers for

people with disabilities and older people», was accepted and will

be presented at the Interactive Technologies and Games (ITAG)

Conference 2015. The conference will take place on 22-23 October

2015 in Nottingham, UK.

ITAG is a yearly conference (around 150 European attendees)

organized by Nottingham Trent University that addresses the

community of developers and educational staff that work with

people with disabilities, including care facilities, special education

schools, etc. and how they can be involved and educated through

new technologies.

The paper that will be presented by the M-Care partners examines

how a gamification approach can enhance and enrich the learning

experience of personal care givers (PCGs) for people with disabili-

ties and older people (potential or in active employment). Using

game elements that pervade the M-Care mobile PCG training

application, users are given the opportunity to self-assess their

newly acquired knowledge and through a rewards system they are

motivated to follow further training courses. The gamified

experience is embedded in a broader educational logic including

an extensive training curriculum and innovative online and mobile

training platforms.

Caring for people with disabilities and older

people: challenges, opportunities and (mobile/

online) training solutions

The final event M-CARE project (Mobile Training for Home

and Health Caregiver For People with Disabilities and Older

People - 539913-LLP-1-2013-1-TR-LEONARDO-LMP) takes

place on 1 December 2015 in Brussels, Belgium at VLEVA

premises.

The event “Caring for people with disabilities and older people: challenges, opportunities and (mobile/online) training solutions” will focus on the importance of good quality personal caregiving

(PCG) for people with disabilities and older people. Focus will be

on caring in a broader perspective, and how M-CARE’s (mobile/online) training solutions contribute to successful PCGs.

When?: Tuesday, 1st December 2015

Where?: Vlaams-Europees

verbindingsagentschap vzw Kortenberglaan 71

1000 Brussels Belgium

Target groups:

(Potential) personal assistants/personal caregivers

Nurses

Social workers People with disabilities

Parents/friends/colleagues Representative organisations of people with disabilities

Policy makers

Practicalities: English is the used language.

Premises are wheelchair accessible.

Registration: Attendance and lunch are free but registration is obligatory, and is

possible via http://mcare-project.eu/m-care-conference-brussels-belgium-1-december-2015/. Any costs incurred in participating to

this event (hotel, travel, subsistence, etc.) must be paid for by the

attendee.

Agenda:

8.30-9.00: Registration

9.00-9.15: Welcome (Seyhan Firat – Gazi University) 9.15-9.30: Opening speech by MEP Helga STEVENS (N-VA)

(Vice-Chair ECR | Co-Chair Disability Intergroup) 9:30-10:00: What is M-CARE and the need for such training -

How we met EQF and implemented ECVET principles (Karel Van Isacker – PhoenixKM / Andrean Lazarov – Interprojects)

10:00-10:30: The M-CARE training content (Andreas Koth – EVBB)

10:30-11:30: Experience in piloting of the training material ("Lessons learnt") + Personal caregivers witness accounts –

(Dr. Bulent Elbasan – Gazi university / Slaveyko Slavkov –

Interprojects / Andreas Koth - EVBB / Maria Goranova – PhoenixKM)

11:30-12.00: break 12:00-12:40: The mobile and online M-CARE training –

(Costas Mourlas – University of Athens / Karel Van Isacker – PhoenixKM)

12:40-14:00: Other caregiving initiatives ELOSH project: the need for good care towards the end

-users, and how to ensure quality - Asel Kadyrbaeva (EASPD - Belgium)

Elderly Care Vocational Certificate / www.ecvleonardo.com - Elderly Care Vocational

training and rehabilitation - Alecos Tringides (IKME & Trysis Ltd. – Cyprus)

Caregiving from a Latin American perspective - Silvia

Margarita Baldiris Navarro (University of Girona – Spain)

Ergotherapy for Elderly People and People with Disabilities – Prof. Hulya Kayihan (Hacettepe University,

Turkey) ITIDE project - Inclusion Training in Intellectual

Disability for Educators in Europe – Susan Atkinson (Leeds Beckett University – UK)

14:00-14:15: Closing (Seyhan Firat – Gazi University / Karel Van Isacker – PhoenixKM)

14:15-16:00: Networking – Lunch buffet 14.15-16.00: M-CARE demo booth – Mobile and Online

Application

Throughout the entire day, participants will be able to use the mobile and online training environments, and provide

feedback.

M-CARE transnational partner meetings

The 5th project meeting will take place in coincidence with the fi-

nal dissemination event in Brussels. Within the meeting the part-ners will report the findings from M-CARE pilot phase and based

on them they will decide on future alterations if needed.

The meeting will end up with a final agreement about exploitation activities that will be implemented after the end of the project.

The last issue of the Newsletter will tell you more about the final

M-Care meeting as well as the final event.

EDPWD policy and other related events PhoenixKM plans to disseminate M-CARE during the 1st week of

December 2015 when the European Day of People with Disabilities policy and other related events will take place.

M-CARE at CAVA 2016

PhoenixKM will present M-CARE project outcomes at CAVA 2016

in Cartagena, Colombia. It will take place on 26-29 July 2016.

Consortium Gazi University, Ankara, Turkey – Project Coordinator

Gazi University is one of the biggest universities of Turkey with over 68.000 students including 56.000 undergraduate

and 12.000 postgraduate students currently studying in its 171 academic departments. Contact person: Prof. Dr. Seyhan FIRAT

Email: sfirat@gazi.edu.tr

Ministry of family and social policy, General Directorate of services for elderly and disabled people, Turkey

The General Directorate coordinates the activities on preparing national policies and strategies aimed at prevention, education, employment and rehabili-

tation services, ensuring that people with disabili-ties fully and equally participate in social life with-

out facing any discrimination. Contact person: Mr. Tayyar Kuz Email: tayyar.kuz@aile.gov.tr

PhoenixKM BVBA, Belgium

PhoenixKM is a consultancy with extensive expertise in the field of education and train-ing that targets people with disabilities, but

also their stakeholders, while making use of the benefits offered by ICT.

Contact person: Mr. Karel Van Isacker Email: karel@phoenixkm.eu

INTERPROJECTS Ltd., Bulgaria INTERPROJECTS is a training provider, having its activities

fully directed towards people with disabilities and older people. Their team consists of experts in the field of acces-sibility issues, career orientation and guidance, employ-

ment, mentoring, e-games and networks of employers of disability etc. Contact person: Mrs. Tonka Cholakova

Email: interprojectsbg@gmail.com University of Athens, Greece

The Laboratory of New Technologies in Communication, Edu-cation and the Mass Media operates within the Faculty of Communication and Mass Media Studies of the National and

Kapodistrian University of Athens. The Laboratory serves re-search and educational needs in the domain of new technol-

ogies and their applications in communication, education and the mass media.

Contact person: Prof. Constantinos Mourlas

Email: mourlas@media.uoa.gr

Europäischer Verband Beruflicher Bildungsträger, Germany EVBB is an Umbrella-Organisation of 50 Vocational Training Centres in 21 European and International

countries and is based in Germany. In 2012 EVBB set up a “Quality Charter”, taking into account the actual developments in European Quality Policy such as EQAVET and EQARF. Contact person: Mr. Fritz-Gerhard KUHN Email: Fritz-Gerhard.kuhn@evbb.EU