Maintaining hygiene standards is the most effective way to combat against the infectious diseases, as they can be transmitted through contacting the surfaces that viruses are available. Hand hygiene is therefore particularly crucial to prevent any possible contract transmission of infectious viruses. Maintaining high hygiene standards is also a necessity to protect the health professionals, allied health workers and support staff from contracting any infectious viruses at their work environment (ibid). In this context, it’s extremely important to follow the hygiene guidelines to protect everyone, especially health staff in care facilities. The main goal of the HYGEIA project is to provide updated, reliable and easily-accessible vocational education and training (VET) on personal and environment hygiene at workplace for healthcare workforce in care settings. We will develop an innovative VET package for health professionals (e.g., doctors, nurses), allied health workers (e.g., physiotherapists, occupational therapists) and support staff (e.g., nurse assistants, ward clerks). All professionals working in a hospital, community and residential care settings must comply with and guarantee high standards of hygiene, for the safety of patients, workers and visitors. This is tremendously an urgent need in contemporary healthcare systems and societies, as emerged from the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic around the world.The HYGEIA project will produce three specific outputs:- NEEDS ANALYSIS: a questionnaire will be developed and disseminated in all countries of the consortium amongst healthcare workforce (for collecting their learning needs and understanding the best digital training options and preferences) and managers of healthcare facilities (for understanding current organisational policies and collecting good practices). A final report will be produced with (quantitative and qualitative) data analysis.- EDUCATIONAL MANUAL FOR PERSONAL AND ENVIRONMENT HYGIENE: the manual will target all health, allied health and administrative workforce employed in different care settings. It will include recommendations for daily working life on how to comply with common and context-specific rules of personal and environment hygiene. Contents will be differentiated according to type of professions (health, allied health, and support personnel).- E-LEARNING MULTIMEDIA COURSE: a mobile application will enable healthcare workers to learn systematically about hygiene, its importance and consequences, how to maintain it together with other people the disease, good practices and tips for addressing most common problems in each care setting (hospital, community and residential care). It will include a serious game for learning by a gamification approach.The HYGEIA project will play a crucial role in improving awareness, attitudes, practices and access to training for all healthcare workers, even those with non-clinical backgrounds who still work in the same environment and experience a huge interaction with other people.

BACKGROUND By the year 2030, estimates suggest that there will be 74.7 million people with different forms of dementias worldwide. There is no cure for dementia, but several non-pharmaceutical interventions are constantly tested and updated to improve patients quality of life. These include, for instance, interventions to increase communication skills, reduce agitation and stress management, and use of new technology. Unfortunately today direct care workers are systematically excluded by accessing such up-to-date evidence to improve their work. This group of workers paradoxically face the highest demanding work situations, being at the same time the most burdened group and the least trained one. Vocational training opportunities for them are totally inadequate OBJECTIVES OF THE PROJECT iDO project mission is to make evidence-based knowledge available for workers in dementia care, reaching professionals who are normally excluded from training opportunities. The project objectives are to: 1) design and develop in close collaboration with people with dementia and their caregivers an innovative training package to promote the acquisition of skills and competences; 2) test the training package with an appropriate number of direct care workers in five EU countries, especially for evaluating its impact on their motivation and inclusion in learning activities; 3) finalize the training package incorporating all feedbacks from end-users; 4) disseminate and scale up the intellectual outputs at a wider EU level, ensuring the sustainability of project results. NUMBER AND PROFILE OF PARTICIPANTSIn an interactive, stepwise co-design and co-production process, we included approx. 2800 participants, including direct care workers (primary target group), people with dementia, their family caregivers, professionals engaged in dementia care (secondary target group) as well as adult studying to qualify as health care and social services professionals. A similar number of men and women were included, aged 20-87. ACTIVITIES AND METHODOLOGY The training package aimed at addressing current barriers to training opportunities among our primary target group, includes eight modules comprising: • testimonial videos created by caregivers and people with dementia explaining their needs and aspirations (Intellectual Output, IO1); • a series of training videos by expert professionals on dementia care good practices, advices and tips on how to improve daily practice routines and address the needs expressed by users (IO2);- In the end of each module a short quiz has to be passed in order to unlock the serious game described below • an interactive serious game was developed in order to enable direct care workers to manage virtually a series of case scenarios and to learn through problem-solving activities (IO3). The game comprises different scenarios common in daily life. The response to the scenarios are measured in terms of dementia care outcomes and can be followed on the screen while playing. Focus group interviews with people with dementia and their family caregivers were held in Sweden, Italy, Greece and Portugal. The findings were analysed applying manifest content analysis and were used as the basis for the development of the testimonial and expert videos (IO1and IO2) MOOC (IO4) and the serious game (IO3). Data for the dementia care outcome indicators in the serious game (IO3) were generated by means of a review of randomised controlled trials published during the previous ten years. Data from the studies were extracted using regression analyses to generate the outcome indicators.All material is included in the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) (IO4) developed and implemented on the Udemy platform. RESULTS AND IMPACT The iDO MOOC (on Udemy) and serious game is publicly available and usable by mobile devices, free of charge in English, Greek, Italian, Lithuanian, Portuguese and Swedish. The MOOC comprises 8 modules on state-of-the-art dementia knowledge, each of them ending with at short quiz, where correct answers unlock more advanced parts of the game. The game and the MOOC are connected via the website idoproject.eu. The MOOC and game seems to improve direct care workers empathy and understanding towards people with dementia and their family carers; it improves their knowledge, skills and competences on dementia care and provides practical tips of best practices interventions in dementia. The game and MOOC have been used by 800+ users and the evaluation of the training package is positive. LONGER TERM BENEFITSConsidering the longer term benefits of iDO results, they are not possible to evaluate yet. However, with the increasing shortage of time possible to allocate for staff education and training, online training tools such as the iDO platform are requested, with high potential to benefit staff, persons with dementia and their caregivers positively.

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In 2015, dementia affected 47 million people worldwide, a figure that represents a roughly 5% of the world’s elderly population, and is predicted to increase to 75 million in 2030 and 132 million by 2050. Recent reviews estimate that globally nearly 9.9 million people develop dementia each year; this figure translates into one new case every three seconds.Worldwide, dementia presents a major cause of disability and dependency, impacting significantly on the diseased individuals, carers, families, communities and societies. Consequently, dementia is one of the fields where research is making great strides in identifying potential new ways to help diagnose, treat, and even prevent.EARLYDEM project comes to contribute from an educational point of view into this research by emphasizing on early diagnosis and early intervention as extremely important yet neglected mechanisms of the dementia treatment strategy Based on the above needs and assumptions, the main objective of EARLYDEM project is the training of formal and informal caregivers of elderly people through the development of an open interactive e-learning platform, on early identification of dementia in order to be alert and to act as prompting factors to timely diagnosis. Diagnostic process and time to diagnosis can be substantially improved by involving formal/informal caregivers as a source of support in initial stages of dementia or MCI. Direct target group are formal/informal caregivers and social care professionals (nurses, social workers, nurse aids) in elderly care. Their role is extremely crucial since a) they are the first ones that could discern the signs and initiate a process to diagnosis of MCI and dementia and b) they may impede the timely diagnosis due to lack of awareness and education. Indirect target group are professionals that have contact with elderly people and may initiate a beneficial intervention in terms of timely diagnosis of MCI and dementia (paramedical staff, police officers, fire workers, clerks etc).7 partners coming from Sweden, Italy, Greece and France, are involved: One academic institution (Lund University), four care providers (Trelleborg, ISRAA, AAADRD and FRODIZO) and two technical partner (Tech4Care and Interactive4d).The project is organized into 5 intellectual outputs:IO1. Baseline study of critical parameters that affect early detection of MCI and dementia. The scope of the baseline study is to analyze the basic parameters needed for the education and training of caregivers as a structural component of primary care in order to play an important role in recognizing the signs and overcoming the barriers affecting timely diagnosis. Timely recognition of worrying signs and trained avoidance of suspending factors will significantly decrease the time needed till a diagnosis is made, resulting in better quality of the life for people with MCI and dementia, better social inclusion and possible less expenses in medicines and institutional treatments.IO2.Methodology and development of the education and training content. The content development of EARLYDEM, based on the results from IO1, aims to provide a complete and well established training material in order to support early recognition of dementia through the development of new skills and new competences for older people and professionals, to contribute to lessening the burden of cognitive decline and to safeguard the wellbeing or older beneficiaries. IO3 Platform design The EARLYDEM e-learning platform will be an open educational resource environment under he format of a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC), offering e-learning modules adapt for use of all formal and informal caregivers and relevant stakeholders. This task is dealing with the implementation of the online training platform that will provide trainers, learners and other stakeholder access to the training material, in appropriate forms that promote interactive and case based learning as well as the means to exchange experiences and opinions through a virtual community of practice.IO4.Piloting and validation of training materialPilots will be designed and applied in accordance to the training modules developed, thus can be used for validating learning, skills acquisition and transferability of the learner's new competencies and skills. In this context, the pilot courses will measure efficiency and the level of positive feedback from both the trainer experts and learner on the clarity, quality, and impact of the material provided. IO5. Sustainability and accreditation planThis output will plan the the sustainability of project outcomes and focus on providing an accreditation scheme for this who will participate in the train during and after the project. Sustainability plans will be produced for the online platform, the training content and the community of stakeholders supported by thes

BACKGROUNDStroke is the second leading cause of disability and is clearly associated with old age, with the risk of being hit which doubles in each successive decade from 55 years old on. The dramatic increase of the demand for stroke rehabilitation, due to current epidemiological trends, is putting care providers and direct care workers under pressure.Direct care workers are a key category in all care settings due to their essential role of providing personal care to patients with stroke (e.g., bathing, hygiene, feeding), practical help (e.g., mobility, socialisation, health education) and support to other health professionals in a variety of activities (e.g., basic medications, preparation of medical tools, administration of drug therapy).The ordinary work context direct care workers have to deal with when assisting people with stroke is highly demanding. They are the most burdened group of workers (since they carry out the most essential tasks) and the least trained one (no academic title for their position is required). Vocational training is also lacking, since the context in which they work usually does not stimulate them to engage in lifelong training activities. Even considering all the above mentioned issues, evidence from the literature suggest that if adequately trained, direct-care staff can contribute to greatly improve patients outcomes, e.g. in terms of quality of life, reduction of agitation, promotion of independence etc., at the same time improving their working conditions. Better-trained staff is indeed more likely to benefit from a reduced work-related stress, burden and injuries.GOAL AND OBJECTIVES: The main goal of the iTRAIN project is to make evidence-based knowledge available also for low-skilled direct care workers involved in stroke care and rehabilitation in home care, hospital and nursing home settings. The project aims to translate up-to-date evidence in accessible, engaging and innovative vocational training on stroke for direct care workers, reaching this category of different professionals who are normally excluded from this knowledge. The iTRAIN project objective is to address this training gap by providing a set of mobile-based digital training contents, designed and developed together with patients, their family caregivers, direct care workers and clinical experts in the field. INNOVATIVE TRAINING PACKAGE: A comprehensive vocational training package, publicly available and usable by mobile devices, will be at disposal of direct care workers dealing with stroke survivors. The package will be produced in six European languages (English, Greek, Swedish, Italian, Portuguese, Lithuanian). The package will include five INTELLECTUAL OUTPUTS (IOs): methodological framework for implementation of a digital inclusive training of direct care workers dealing with stroke survivors (IO1); vocational education methodology and handbook (IO2); multimedial training videos of patients, caregivers and experts (IO3); mobile-based serious game for learning and self-assessment (IO4); massive online open course (MOOC) with all multimedial materials.NUMBER OF TARGETED BENEFICIARIESWe will involve, in an interactive co-design, testing and dissemination process, over 2,800 participants, including direct care workers (primary target group), patients, family caregivers, employers, unions, patients' associations, clinical units for stroke, and other stakeholders (secondary and tertiary target groups).RESULTS AND IMPACT The iTRAIN project will create a comprehensive vocational training package, publicly available and usable also by mobile devices, at disposal of direct care workers dealing with stroke survivors for free in six European languages (English, Greek, Swedish, Italian, Portuguese, Lithuanian). The training package characteristics are expected to provide a motivating and enjoyable learning experience for a group of workers usually excluded by lifelong learning activities. The use of an ICT-based gamification approach for delivering the training package will allow establishing both feedback loops to adapt VET provision to end-users needs and an objective tracking systems of learning outcomes. The training package is expected to: improve direct care workers attitudes towards people with stroke and their family caregivers (most of all, their level of empathy and understanding towards these users); improve their knowledge, skills and competences on stroke care and rehabilitation; provide them with practical inputs from best practices in stroke care for stimulating reflections on how to improve their clinical routines.