Widening Research on Pervasive and eHealth - WideHealth

Información del proyecto

WideHealth

Identificador del acuerdo de subvención: 952279

DOI

10.3030/952279

Proyecto cerrado

Fecha de la firma de la CE 18 Junio 2020

Fecha de inicio 1 Enero 2021

Fecha de finalización 30 Junio 2023

Financiado con arreglo a

• Twinning of research institutions

Coste total

€ 899 707,50

Aportación de la UE

€ 899 707,50

Coordinado por

Ss. CYRIL AND METHODIUS UNIVERSITY IN SKOPJE
North Macedonia

Periodic Reporting for period 2 - WideHealth (Widening Research on Pervasive and eHealth - WideHealth)

Período documentado: 2022-01-01 hasta 2023-06-30

Resumen del contexto y de los objetivos generales del proyecto

The aging population and rising chronic cases are among the most pressing issues in our society: as a consequence, the importance of pervasive healthcare is becoming more and more important in our lives. Pervasive healthcare supports the maintenance and/or the increase of the health, wellbeing, and quality of life by utilising digital technologies: research on this topic educate experts, promote home-grown research and development, and increase general awareness of the topic and its potential on impacting the local views on technology-enabled healthcare provisioning.

WideHealth aimed to foster research exchanges and training in Pervasive Health and eHealth. The project's overarching goal was to empower researchers from less developed (widening) countries with knowledge and abilities to create and adapt innovative eHealth technologies for diverse healthcare contexts. The project focused: data-driven healthcare, human factors in pervasive health, and federated machine learning. WideHealth also included training for administrative and research staff. The project included three widening partners, Ss. Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje (UKIM) from North Macedonia, as the project coordinator, Institut Jožef Stefan (JSI) from Slovenia, and Fciencias.Id - Associação para a Investigação e Desenvolvimento de Ciências (FC.ID) from Portugal; in addition, the consortium includes Fondazione Bruno Kessler (FBK) from Italy and Hasso Plattner Institute (HPI) from Germany, as non-widening partners.

The WideHealth project objectives were categorized into four groups. The first three groups directly addressed the challenges outlined in the EC call and primarily benefitted the widening partners (UKIM, JSI, and FC.ID) with a particular focus on the Coordinator (UKIM). The fourth group served as a foundation for achieving the first three objectives and directly concerned the non-widening partners (FBK and HPI):
1. Increase the scientific and technological capacity of the (widening) partners;
2. Improve the research-management skills of the widening partners, particularly the Coordinator;
3. Enhance the reputation and collaboration opportunities of the partners; and
4. Improve training capacity of the partners.

Trabajo realizado desde el comienzo del proyecto hasta el final del período abarcado por el informe y los principales resultados hasta la fecha

During the second reporting period of the project (January 2022 - June 2023), the Consortium achieved all planned targets and milestones based on the defined objectives:
1. Enhance the scientific and technological capacity of the partners, especially those from widening countries:
1.1. Three thematic schools: School on e-Health & Pervasive Technologies in Skopje in Feb'22, School on Human Factors in Pervasive Health in Lisbon in July'22 and School on Trustworthy AI in Potsdam in March'23.
1.2 The training materials developed for the schools have served as a foundation for the WideHealth training repository.
1.3 13 research seminars were held during this period. The seminars were promoted on the website and social media accounts, also recordings accessible via the project's YouTube channel.
1.4 Maintained 13 collaborations focused on pervasive health research problems (three concluded in the first year), and out of these collaborations a total of 12 early-stage researchers were jointly supervised.
1.5 Four longer-term (one-month) exchanges of PhD students took place. WideHealth also facilitated more than 40 shorter-term exchange opportunities for students, and 25 short-term exchanges for senior researchers.
1.6 Organised five external events, i.e. one workshop, one conference, and three roundtable/panel discussions

2. Bridge the gap for widening institutions in effectively managing research-related activities and project administration:
2.1 Prepared training materials and arranged seven training events
2.2 To reinforce ethics, data management, and the legal framework - the project prepared training materials and facilitated five training events.
2.3 The project supported the development of the Gender Equality Plan at the Coordinator side UKIM.

3. Deriving quantifiable outcomes from collaborative efforts across the project, directly stemming from other work packages:
3.1 In addition to the three journal papers in the first year, the project successfully published an additional five joint papers in high-impact journals during the second reporting period.
3.2 Eight joint papers were published in peer-reviewed international conferences
3.3 Organised a special issue in the Sensors journal on "Smart Sensing for Pervasive Health".
3.4 In addition to the two joint project proposals submitted in the first year, the project members developed and submitted an additional four joint project proposals.

Based on the generated project results the project used several dissemination and exploitation tools such as: the project website, social media outreach, project newsletters, press releases and general media appearances, workshop and conference organization, etc. ensuring a more impactful project promotion and improved visibility.

Avances que van más allá del estado de la técnica e impacto potencial esperado (incluida la repercusión socioeconómica y las implicaciones sociales más amplias del proyecto hasta la fecha)

The impact of the project can be measured using different indicators, such as the generation of research excellence, enhancement of reputation and attractiveness, and the capability to compete for research funding.

Specifically, the project generated 16 joint collaborations on relevant research problems, resulting in of 11 papers in high-impact journals, out of which 8 are joint publications, as well as total of 19 conference publications, with 12 being joint contributions.
The project also generated joint organisation of four project events at international conferences, four public roundtable/panel discussions, and three thematic schools. Also, at the end of the project we organized a final dissemination event in Skopje (N. Macedonia) where various local stakeholders (companies, policy makers, educational institutions, etc) were invited to participate. In all these events, widening partners extended their reputation, attractiveness, and their networking channels towards the non-widening countries in the project and beyond.
The project-developed training materials, which were base to launch a training repository which now offers four thematic courses in the area of pervasive health and machine learning.
The networks of non-widening partners expanded towards the widening countries through the development of six joint project proposals during the project lifetime, and collaborative organization of project events in widening countries. Facilitated by the research expertise obtained throughout the research activities and the training provided in the project, the Coordinator (UKIM) accredited a Master’s degree programme in Data Science.

Furthermore, WideHealth has been acknowledged as one of the Twinning success stories by the EC which was featured in a news article. This recognition reflects the project's achievements, impact, and the positive strides it has made within its defined scope.
Based on the listed outputs that the project has exceeded expectations, surpassing the established benchmarks for the majority of the performance metrics.

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