In 2017, the annual International Conference on Health Promoting Hospitals and Health Services (International HPH Conference) will be hosted by the Austrian Network of Health Promoting Hospitals and Health Care Institutions (ONGKG), which was already involved into previous International HPH Conferences. The conference venue will be the University of Vienna, one of the oldest universities in Europe. Thus, for its 25th anniversary the conference will be held in the city where HPH has its origins. The Austrian network, founded already in 1996, has made valuable contributions to the international HPH Network, not least by serving on HPH Task Forces and by providing new scientific and practical inputs through its close collaboration with the WHO Collaborating Centre for Health Promotion in Hospitals and Health Care in Vienna.
The title and focus of the 25th International HPH Conference will be "Directions for Health Promoting Health Care. Lessons from the past, solutions for the future". Under this general theme, the conference will specifically focus on five sub-themes:
Having started with the first WHO-Model Project "Health and Hospital" at the Rudolfstiftung Hospital in Vienna in 1989, HPH has developed from mere conceptual considerations and pilot efforts to a significant international network comprising up to 800 member organizations around the globe. Accordingly, this session will take a look back on the achievements but also at challenges and opportunities that have influenced the development of the network up to now. Furthermore, a first diagnosis of future challenges and trends will shed a light on necessary developments of HPH networks.
By the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), United Nations (UN) have defined a new, universal set of goals, targets and indicators that UN member states are expected to use to frame their agendas and political actions in the course of the next 15 years. Accordingly, this session will focus on the following topics: What are the specific implications of the SDGs for health systems? Are there synergies between HPH and the SDGs that can be tackled in the future? How can the international HPH Network but also national and regional networks contribute to achieve the SDGs in different countries? Finally, what can be next steps towards 2030 for reaching these goals?
The considerable movements of refugees and migrants represent one of the major challenges for (European) public health. Their health status is at risk due to trauma, abuse and discrimination, and additionally hampered by barriers to access health and social services in host countries. Thus, how can equal access to and participation in health services be ensured for refugees and migrants? What are opportunities and threats to tackle refugees' and migrants' health? How can health promoting health care support refugees and migrants as well as health care staff confronted with this new challenge?
The progressive climate change characterizes another major challenge within the 21st century. While hospitals and health services require considerable energy-intensive processes in terms of water, lighting, heating, cooling, ventilation as well as waste disposal, adequate mitigation measures can help to use resources more efficiently. Thereby, not only resources of the health sector can be saved in the short and long term, but also the provision of health care services can be enhanced and health status can be (in-) directly improved. Accordingly, this session will deal with the following issues: What are the requirements to build climate resilient health systems? What are the contributions of "sustainable health care services"? And specifically, what are the lessons learned from the HPH Task Force on "HPH & Environment"?
Already 30 years ago, the Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion of the World Health Organization defined the reorientation of health services as one of its five major action areas. Therefore, now is the time to look more closely at what has been achieved since then. Was the settings approach a successful strategy for gaining reorientation? Which preconditions, resources and incentives are needed to further support reorientation? What can be expected from more systematically using developments of the digital revolution? What role can and should the various stakeholders play? Last but not least, how can the systematic and sustainable involvement of patients, families and citizens be better ensured in health promoting healthcare in the future?