Non-communicable diseases (NCDs), including cardiovascular diseases (CVDs), are a major public health and economic challenge in the European Union (EU).
To address this issue, alongside the nine EU4Health Action Grants focusing on ‘Prevention of NCDs (CVDs, diabetes and other NCDs)’ – of which RESIL-Card – the European Commission funds pan-European initiatives such as the Joint Action on Cardiovascular Diseases and Diabetes (JACARDI), which aims to reduce the disease burden at both individual and societal levels through prevention and management.
Endowed with a budget of €66 million, JACARDI involves 76 partners from 21 European countries. From November 2023 to October 2027, 142 tailor-made pilot projects will be carried out in public and clinical settings through 6 work packages covering the entire patient journey:
- Health literacy and awareness
- Data availability, quality, accessibility and sharing
- Screening high-risk populations and individuals
- Integrated care pathways
- Patients’ self-management
- Labour participation of people living with CVD and diabetes
The efforts in enhancing cardiovascular and diabetes care in Europe will involve tackling inequalities in prevention, diagnosis, and management by promoting inclusive governance and addressing social and commercial health determinants. The pilot results will inform scalable, evidence-based policies, fostering resilient and equitable communities while supporting EU health strategies.
To maximise the impact of EU funding for the prevention and control of NCDs, fostering collaboration between JACARDI and the Action Grants is essential.
A collective reflection led by the JACARDI Coordination team was conducted with the Action Grants over the last year to identify commonalities, complementarities, and opportunities for collaboration among these projects with the objective to enhance knowledge sharing, resource optimisation, and overall effectiveness.
Along with the other Action Grants, RESIL-Card compared objectives, strategies and activities across 4 key areas – communication/dissemination, equity, implementation and sustainability – and identified synergies and complementarities to support the development of potential joint actions.
The synergy meeting held in Rome on October 28th, 2024 under the JACARDI Coordination team’s leadership was the occasion for the representatives of JACARDI and the Action Grants to get together to review and validate the final synergy framework, baseline to the recently released synergy action plan that creates a unified strategy to enhance resource efficiency and knowledge sharing.
Cross-communication initiatives, equity and diversity masterclasses, sustainability workshops, resilience webinars are just a few examples of joint actions that will involve JACARDI and RESIL-Card throughout 2025 with the aim to amplify the effectiveness of each project while promoting a harmonised effort to tackle CVDs within the framework of the EU4Health Programme.
