Periodic Reporting for period 1 - HEART (HEAlthier Cities through Blue-Green Regenerative Technologies: the HEART Approach)
Reporting period: 2021-03-01 to 2022-08-31
HEART aims to monitor and quantitively assess the impact of the blue-green urban environment on both physical and mental health, considering also socioeconomic aspects. Based on the outcomes, our main target is to create the HEART’s Blue Green (BG)-based methodology that encapsulates Public Health (PH) and Well Being (WB) criteria to the urban planning as main factors for future design and regeneration of European cities. Towards this direction, HEART incorporates advanced and emerging ICT-enabled technologies such as physical activity devices, integrated bio-sensors with the ability to monitor a variety of physiological signals, wearable bio-sensing devices, as well as chat-bot interfaces, always combined with prevailing monitoring methods and of the enabling environmental quality. The HEART integrated system will apply this quantitative robust evidence of BG performance for planning and policies by involving all relevant stakeholders in co-planning/design methodology and extrapolating it initially to the selected extrapolation areas of the participating cities (Aarhus, Athens and Belgrade) and then to the other European countries. Last but not least, the HEART results will be expanded to a wide network of health policy makers, healthcare providers and professionals, as well as to cities and strategic partnerships with all major networks worldwide. HEART aims to push health and governmental authorities to consider not only cost-effectiveness criteria towards urban planning, but also healthier living parameters in the cities.
HEART focused on the following activities during the reporting period: WP1’s main aim consisted in the implementation of the framework for the continuous involvement of the stakeholders, including experts from medical institutions, regional authorities and civic groups. The involvement process was performed through three methods, semi-structured interviews (16 medical experts and 8 employees of the municipalities and city authorities), workshops (3 workshops in the three demo sites and 102 citizens in total participated) and questionnaires collected from the citizens workshops. Also, we defined the user requirements and technical specifications. As the result of work done under WP2 we developed the multi-dimensional indicators framework which integrated several categories related to health (mental and physical), wellbeing (both objective and subjective dimensions), social, environmental, and economic-related aspects (D2.1) presented the detailed approach to assess effects of BGS in economic, environmental, and social aspects and also proposed a more general Livability model (D2.2) and developed the HCPM too. The clinical protocol (under WP3), is one of the most critical parts of HEART study, referring to the algorithm of historical and clinical data collection, production and storage, along with the HEART instructions to the participants. The consent forms, translated in participant’s native languages have been also printed and the first study approval has been obtained in all three clinical settings. Finally, midterm recruitment of the half of the 800 in total participants of the HEART project has been executed. During the reporting period, the design and development of all HEART ICT tools that will be used in the clinical studies of WP5 was started. Using as a starting point the functional and non-functional requirements of the ICT tools defined in D1.3 the design of the HEART system architecture and the system specifications were finalized. Since the beginning of the WP5 in M16, the work of WP5 partners was directed towards the development of the HEART monitoring system and data acquisition and inventory. Within the reporting period, we widely and effectively disseminating and communicating project results to various audiences through targeted activities through HEART website and HEART social networks (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube). We have 4 issues of press releases 1 edition of the newsletter published/sent out through central HEART and partners’ channels. In the same period, 1 newsletter was published/sent out through Mailchimp platform and can be found on the HEART Website at this link. As regards the exploitation activities, the partners’ individual exploitation plans were initially mapped in order to be the seed for the overall exploitation strategy. Project Management is performed within the scope of WP9. The main scope of this WP is to: ensure that the project activities take place according to the plan (including timely delivery of reports), risks are managed and mitigated, consortium collaboration is both effective and efficient, project results are of good quality, international standards are monitored and applied when useful, and finally that issues are considered for relevant parts of the project. During this period the Advisory Board of the project, has been also established. As the project moved to plan prospective patient data collection activities, within WP3, legal review of the templates for ethical approval applications, including informed consent forms and privacy notices for the data collection in those tasks was performed. Also, the interviews and questionnaires in WP1 were verified for compliance with the privacy rules. Furthermore, DPOs were contacted to confirm conformity of the submission of data from their facility with the local hospital rules. Review of local requirements relating to collection of data for research purposes to ensure not only GDPR compliance, but also to address the data providers requirements has been performed.
Regarding the state-of-the-art and beyond, HEART provides key innovative elements in health and urban environment. HEART HCPM will establish a systematic interconnection of project PH and WB goals, targets, functions, concepts and solutions – pre-planning analysis, supported by the evidence based, clinically proven data sets, to systemically enhance the environmental (living) conditions directly responsible for PH and WB. In addition, the integration of HEART novel ICT tools will extend the applicability of the health monitoring and assistive technologies, providing new capabilities for vulnerable users in an extended context of a smart city. HEART targets to a multiregional clinical study in contrast to the current approaches targeting only specific regions. Therefore, heterogeneous environmental and urban BG space settings will be considered. HEART targets a wide range of health disorders. HEART will provide a planning criterion that suggests systemic urban regeneration rather than sustainability. Once regeneration criteria are introduced as urban planning standard, tangible life quality related benefits will be achievable. HEART innovates in social interaction and inequality reduction by introducing a mechanism for creating an enhanced level of understanding and mutual support of social groups. The method, designed to improve citizens cognitive performance and social health, will be based on the creation not only of specific urban spaces but also expanding it to the other parts of the city needed for social interactions and use of web-based dynamic interactive continuing dialogue tested in the demo-cities. HEART project aims to provide evidence that regular visits in Blue-Green areas not only affect the health and WB of the patients but also have a positive influence on social aspects of their life.