The Heart Failure Policy Network (HFPN), for which The Health Policy Partnership acts as secretariat, has co-developed a new campaign calling on MEPs and European Parliamentary candidates to pledge their support for improving the lives of EU citizens with heart failure.
The heart failure pledge campaign is led by the Heart Failure Patient Council of the Global Heart Hub, a non-profit organisation. HFPN is supporting the campaign and has developed a dedicated website to house the pledge.
Heart failure is a serious and complex chronic syndrome, which affects at least 15 million people in Europe. It leads to poor quality of life and survival for many people – worse than for most common types of cancer. It also accounts for significant healthcare expenditure, and this is set to grow; hospital admissions due to heart failure are projected to rise by 50% over the next 25 years. Heart failure poses a sustainability challenge for our healthcare systems and societies, and requires urgent action.
The heart failure pledge consists of commitments in six key areas:
- Developing a formal strategy on heart failure
- Supporting timely and appropriate diagnosis of heart failure
- Encouraging multidisciplinary care
- Improving professional education on heart failure
- Supporting person-centred approaches in heart failure care
- Developing robust and public national audits of performance.
The heart failure pledge campaign was launched on 23 April 2019 and will run until after the European Parliament elections on 23–26 May 2019.
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The Global Heart Hub (previously known as the International Heart Hub) is the first global non-profit organisation that brings together and supports the creation of patient groups from every country in the world to raise awareness of heart disease and improve lives.
The Heart Failure Policy Network is an independent, multidisciplinary group of healthcare professionals, patient advocacy groups, policymakers and other stakeholders from across Europe whose goal is to raise awareness of the unmet needs surrounding heart failure and its care.
For more information on the heart failure pledge campaign, please visit: www.hfpledge.eu
