TEAM Project: Supporting Innovation in Telemedicine Education with Cross-European Collaboration
- November 23, 2023
- Katja Peterlin
- 0
The Telemedicine Education Advancement through Micro-credentials (TEAM) project officially commenced with an inaugural virtual kick-off meeting on November 16, 2023. This international collaborative effort, co-financed by the European Union under the Erasmus programme (Cooperation partnership in Higher Education), involves partners from six European countries: Belgium, Slovenia, Croatia, Greece, Ukraine, and Romania.
In light of the European telemedicine market’s rapid growth, projected to escalate from €11.6 billion in 2020 to €27 billion by 2025, TEAM addresses a critical barrier: the shortage of IT training among healthcare providers. The European Commission and the World Health Organization have both stressed the necessity of structured telemedicine training to fully leverage this burgeoning sector.
The TEAM project aims to revolutionise digital health and telemedicine education by developing flexible learning pathways that align with global best practices. It focuses on addressing challenges such as limited digital literacy and aims to bolster cross-sectoral collaboration. The initiative is especially pivotal for countries with urgent healthcare needs.
The kick-off meeting, led by the project coordinator, Faculty of Information Studies in Novo mesto (FIS), brought together a consortium of European educational and healthcare organizations. Representatives from each partner organization outlined their contributions and roles, setting the stage for a collaborative and effective project implementation.
Notably, the project targets primary groups including higher education students in healthcare and IT, faculty, educators, and institutions, as well as secondary groups like healthcare professionals, IT professionals, policy-makers, stakeholders, and Vocational Education and Training (VET) institutions.
In the meeting, FIS presented the project overview, emphasizing the objectives, expected impacts, and strategic implementation approaches. RIT Croatia introduced Work Package 2 (WP2), focusing on Telemedicine Education and Industry Partnership Mapping, which lays the foundation for future project activities. Other crucial components such as the Micro-credentials in Telemedicine (WP3), Test & Validation, and the Telemedicine Digital Warehouse (WP4) were also discussed.
The TEAM project not only signifies a major step forward in telemedicine education but also serves as a beacon of EU-wide collaboration in enhancing healthcare services through digital innovation.