WHO Collaborating Centres
WHO Collaborating Centre for Education, Research and Evaluation of Safety and Quality Healthcare
About Us
World Health Organization has designated the National School of Public Health, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa as a WHO Collaborating Centre for Education, Research and Evaluation of Safety and Quality in Healthcare on 11th June, 2020. The Collaborating Centre is composed by a multidisciplinary team integrating professors, researchers, PhD and Master students, decision makers and frontline healthcare professionals. The Head of the Centre is Professor Paulo Sousa.
Research and Projects
Research, Projects and Activities
As we all know, this was an atypical year due to all constraints arising out of the global COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, some of the foreseen activities did not take place, others were postponed or suffered some delays. Nevertheless, this was also a year in which great and important steps were taken in the area of Patient Safety, such as the concrete action to eliminate avoidable harm in health care by adopting the first ever “Global Patient Safety Action Plan 2021–2030” approved in the WHA held in May 28th, 2021. Moreover, 2020/2021 was also a period of adaptation and organization of our work group (as a WHOcc) which was greatly facilitated due to the good relationship created with WHO staff.
Planned activities for 2020-2022
a)To support WHO’s work towards the revision of WHO Patient Safety Curriculum Guide, an initiative lead by WHO and by colleagues of the Imperial College - Global Patient Safety Collaborative, Centre for Health Policy, Institute of Global Health Innovation;
b)To Support reinforcement and dissemination of the Framework on Patient Safety and Family Engagement
c)To support WHO’s activities towards the provision of capacity building on patient safety, mainly in Portuguese language.
d)Support the translation of WHO materials on patient safety and quality of care.
e)Support WHO in building capacity of national governments in planning, implementing and evaluating national quality policies and strategies (NQPS) in Lusophone countries.
ON GOING AND ALREADY DEVELOPED ACTIVITIES
a) WHO Curriculum Guide for Patient Safety participation, an initiative lead by WHO and by colleagues of the Imperial College - Global Patient Safety Collaborative, Centre for Health Policy, Institute of Global Health Innovation.
b)Participation in several meetings led by WHO and the Imperial College team - Global Patient Safety Collaborative together with fellow colleagues.
b) We have been reinforcing and disseminating the Patients for Patient Safety framework within the different health professionals and decision makers in Portuguese speaking countries.
c) – Together with ISQua colleagues and members of the Ministry of Health of Mozambique, have been developing the content and structure of a Patient Safety and Quality Improvement Course to be implemented in Mozambique. This course will be online, it will involve over 80 healthcare professionals, and it will be free of charge.
d)- Technical and scientific revision of the Portuguese version of National Quality Policy and Strategy framework, which is already available in the WHO website. Link here: https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/272357/9789240005709-por.pdf
e) - Several meetings have been held with representatives of the Ministry of Health of Mozambique, the WHO representative in Mozambique and WHO Geneva in order to discuss how WHO and the National School of Public Health, as a WHOcc, can help Mozambique define and implement their own National Quality and Policy Strategy.
f)We are preparing the commemoration of the World Patient Safety Day, which will be spread through different international channels.
News
Global Patient Safety Action Plan 2021-2030
Technical and scientific revision of the Portuguese version of Global Patient Safety Action Plano 2021-2030, which is already available in the WHO website. Link here: https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789240032705
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
The 1st Meeting of the Minds on Quality of Care, organized by the Athens Quality of Care Office, Division Country Health Policies and Systems, WHO Regional Office for Europe took place in December 2nd and 3rd . In this meeting Portugal was represented by Prof Paulo Sousa and Prof Adalberto Fernandes from the National School of Public Health, NOVA University of Lisbon, Prof. Fernando Araújo, President of the Administration board of the university hospital of São João, Prof Válter Fonseca. Director of the Department for Quality in Health - General Directorate of Health, Dr. Alexandre Lourenço President of APAH and European Association of Hospital Managers, and by Dr. António Marques Pinto, President of European Association of Junior Doctors.
The meeting served as the ideal forum for discussions of quality of care and patient safety issues that require openness, transparency, innovation and accountability for the transformation of health systems, health promotion and protection cultures.
The 1st WHO Meeting of the Minds on Quality of Care aimed to:
i) Produce a Compendium of applied good practices based on Member States’ response at national, regional or even local or facility level, during the COVID-19 pandemic as relates to quality of care and patient safety issues;
You can find the Compendium of applied good practices here.:
ii) Elicit the main elements of a roadmap/ framework for implementation of essential actions, to move forward on each one of the five thematic areas that form the focus of this meeting.
Theme 1. Innovation, cutting edge tools and good practices in the fields of quality of care and patient safety including digital health services
Theme 2. Partnerships, stakeholders’ engagement and establishment of supportive collaboration and mutual learning networks in the area of quality of care
Theme 3. Response during COVID-19 pandemic related to quality of care and patient safety
Theme 4. Patients’ perspectives on quality: enhancing patient-informed involvement and shared decision making in healthcare
Theme 5. Implementation and evaluation of evidence- based national quality of care plans/initiatives.
Supporting Portuguese speaking countries to adopt WHO National Quality Policy and Strategy framework
The Coordinator of the WHO Collaborating Centre for Education, Research and Evaluation of Safety and Quality Healthcare, Professor Paulo Sousa, is part of the WHO/ISQua working group for supporting countries to implement the WHO National Quality Policy and Strategy framework.
Some members of the WHO Collaborating Centre for Education, Research and Evaluation of Safety and Quality Healthcare were responsible for the technical and scientific revision of the Portuguese version of National Quality Policy and Strategy framework.
Link available here: https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/272357/9789240005709-por.pdf
a) WHO Global Patient Safety Action Plan 2021-2030
Click on the following link for access the WHO Global Patient Safety Action Plan 2021-2030:
After the World Health Assembly of 28th May, 2021, the delegates agreed on concrete action to eliminate avoidable harm in health care by adopting the first ever “Global Patient Safety Action Plan 2021–2030”.
The WHO Global Patient Safety Action Plan 2021-2030 was presented on the 74th World Health Assembly in 2021 through the Executive Board at its 148th session. This was an historic moment and will provide for the first time a strategic direction for improving patient safety through the definition of seven strategic objectives, which can be achieved through 35 specific strategies. This action plan is directed to all relevant stakeholders, namely to health care facilities, governments, international organizations, intergovernmental organizations and civil society.
WHO is now initiating the process of preparation of the workplans for WHO Patient Safety Flagship for the next biennium (2022-2023).
b) 17th September 2021- World Patient Safety Day
World Patient Safety Day was first established in 2019 to create awareness about patient safety, increase public engagement and to gather stakeholders in the health care system to work together and share engagement to improve patient safety. This will be the 3rd consecutive year of that campaign.
You can see all the campaigns in the following link:
https://www.who.int/campaigns/world-patient-safety-day
This year, the World Patient Safety Day will be focus on promoting global actions to enhance Safe maternal and newborn care - “Act now for safe and respectful childbirth!”
The National School of Public Health, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa as a WHO Collaborating Centre for Education, Research and Evaluation of Safety and Quality in Healthcare will celebrate this day with a symbolic event.
Following the previous years, the signature mark of the global campaign is to light up iconic monuments, landmarks, and public places in the color orange.
Objectives of World Patient Safety Day 2021:
- Raise global awareness on the issues of maternal and newborn safety, particularly during childbirth.
- Engage multiple stakeholders and adopt effective and innovative strategies to improve maternal and newborn safety.
- Call for urgent and sustainable actions by all stakeholders to scale up efforts, reach the unreached and ensure safe maternal and newborn care, particularly during childbirth.
- Advocate the adoption of best practices at the point of care to prevent avoidable risks and harm to all women and newborns during childbirth.
More info in the following link:
Related Links
Other related links
- Website: https://www.who.int/
- ERNST COST Action : https://www.cost.eu/actions/CA19113/#tabs|Name:overview
- Website: https://isqua.org/
- PROQUALIS Website: https://proqualis.net/
- IHI Website: http://www.ihi.org/
- WHO Collaborating Centre for Patient Safety and Patient Engagement (Canada) : https://www.patientsafetyinstitute.ca/en/About/Programs/WHO-Collaborating-Centre/Pages/default.aspx
- WHO Collaborating Centre in Human Factors and Communication for the Delivery of Safe and Quality (Florence, Italy) care:https://www.regione.toscana.it/documents/10180/587328/GRC_WHO+Collaborating+Centre.pdf/a87d847e-b475-4ebb-82ed-b1c4126202bd
Contact Us
E-mail: qualsafety.whocc@ensp.unl.pt
Team
adalberto campos fernandes
Associate Professor at NOVA-NSPH. Areas of interest and specialization are Health Systems Policies and Administration, Health Strategies and Health Organizations Management.
PhD in Health Administration from the University of Lisbon. Master in Public Health in the specialty of Health Services Administration by ENSP-NOVA. Competence in Pharmaceutical Medicine and Health Management by the Portuguese Medical Association. Specialist in Public Health. Degree in Medicine from the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Lisbon.
Minister of Health of the XXI Constitutional Government (2015-2018). Former Chairman of the Board of Directors of Hospital de Santa Maria, Hospital Pulido Valente and Centro Hospitalar de Lisboa Norte. President of the Executive Committee of SAMS Prestação Integrada de Cuidados de Saúde. Former Chairman of the Board of Directors of HPP Parcerias Saúde, Hospital de Cascais. More information here.
florentino serraNheira
Associate Professor of Occupational Health, Member of the Public Health Research Center (CISP).
Areas of academic interest:
Occupational Health, Ergonomics, Work-Related Musculoskeletal Disorders (WRMSDs), Occupational Health and Safety, Patient Safety, Public Health.
Chairperson of the Supervisory Board of the Portuguese Association of Ergonomics (APERGO); Author and co-author of books, book chapters and several articles in scientific journals on areas of academic interest. More information here.
ÂNGELA GUERREIRO
Patients for Patient Safety (PFPS) Researcher, Master Student in Public Health at National School of Public Health - Nova University Lisbon.
CATARINA MENDES
Master in Bioethics and in Nursing with Medical and Surgical specialization from the Institute of Health Sciences, Portuguese Catholic University (Lisbon).
Works at the Patient Safety Office in the Centro Hospitalar Universitário Lisboa Central (Portugal), since 2012. More information here.
HELGA OLIVEIRA
Professor at Escola Superior de Saúde Atlântica. Researcher at Nursing Research, Innovation and Development Centre Lisbon (CIDNUR). More information here.
maria joão lobão
Internal Medicine Department, Hospital de Cascais and Lusíadas Saúde Cascais. PhD in Public Health from NOVA National School of Public Health, Comprehensive Health Research Center (CHRC), Universidade NOVA, Lisbon, Portugal. More information here.
susana ramos
Nurse manager, coordinator of the Patient Safety Office at the Centro Hospitalar Universitário de Lisboa Central. Master’s in Infection in Health Care. Postgraduate in Patient Safety and postgraduate Management of Services and Clinical Areas.
Interest Areas: patient safety; patient involvement in patient safety; patient advocacy; health literacy; risk management; healthcare infection prevention and control; clinical audit. More information here.
ANA CATARINA RODRIGUES
Integrates WHO Collaborating Centre for Education, Research and Evaluation of Safety and Quality in Healthcare. Medical Resident in Public Health, Postgraduation in Healthcare Management (2018), Master in Medicine (2016).
Areas of interest: Healthcare Quality Management and Quality Improvement.
eduardo RODRIGUES
Medical doctor, founder and CEO of UpHill, a digital clinical pathway software company that improves health outcomes through the implementation of evidence-based best practices in health units.
Specialized in Public Health, having designed the core Information system for COVID in Portugal. Post-graduated in Clinical Research by Harvard Medical School.
carlos palos
Consultant in Internal Medicine, specialist in Intensive Care Medicine. Coordinator of the Central Office for the Infection Prevention and Antimicrobial Resistance Control of Grupo Luz Saúde. PhD student in Public Health at NOVA-National School of Public Health. Regent of the Curricular Unit Adult and Elderly Pathology of Nursing Degree, Portuguese Catholic University, Lisbon.
josé pedro teixeira
Degree in Medicine by NOVA Medical School. Currently Medical Resident in Public Health in the Sintra Public Health Unit.
Main areas of interest: Evidence-based Policymaking, Quality in Health and Patient Safety, Health Technology Assessment and Urban Health.
sofia guerra paiva
Public Health PhD fellow in the area of Politics, Management and Administration of Health at NOVA National School of Public Health Comprehensive Health Research Center (CHRC). Master in Health Management. Training School Coordinator of European Researchers' Network Working on Second Victims.
Areas of interest: patient safety, second victim, adverse events, effective communication in health services, risk management. More information here.