The World Obesity Federation is a registered charity based in England with professional member organisations in 21 EU and 5 other European countries. Although our work addresses issues beyond the European Region, in this FPA and SGA, we seek support only for our European-focused activities which are directly relevant to the Community’s 3rd Health Programme.

In this respect our general objectives are (i) to ensure overweight people in Europe receive the best available support for weight management and prevention of comorbid disease, (ii) to reduce obesity prevalence in European populations through prevention strategies, and (iii) to take due account of socio-demographic inequalities in the use of health services and in response to prevention initiatives.

To fulfil these objectives, we offer web-based training for professional obesity treatment and weight management, which will be provided by recognised experts and available to practitioners across the Community’s health services. We also provide data and policy dissemination activities for the development of obesity prevention strategies in the European region.

Our work programme 2015-2017 includes expanding our web-based training programme for health professionals and translating modules into European languages, developing a data portal for adult and child prevalence statistics in the region, and updating and extending our mapping service of European policy and community intervention activities.

These activities are relevant to the 3rd Health Programme’s specific objective 1 for cost-effective disease prevention (especially to identify, disseminate and promote evidence-based and good practices for cost-effective disease prevention and health promotion), and specific objective 3 for building health systems (especially to address shortage of resources, develop cross-border expertise and facilitate innovation in public health interventions and prevention strategies).

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OBesity Training And INformation Services for Europe (OBTAINS-E) is a program of work run by the World Obesity Federation (formerly IASO-IOTF). The World Obesity Federation is a registered charity based in the UK with professional membership organisations in 21 EU and 5 other European countries. The Federation undertakes work beyond the European Region, but in this proposal it seeks support only for the European-focused activities which are directly relevant to the Community's 3rd Health Programme. The objectives are (i) to ensure that people in Europe who are overweight can receive the best available support for weight management and prevention of co-morbid disease, (ii) to reduce obesity prevalence in European populations through prevention strategies, and (iii) to take account of socio-demographic inequalities in the use of health services and in response to prevention initiatives.To fulfil these objectives, the Federation offers web-based training for professional obesity treatment and weight management, provided by recognised experts and available to practitioners across the Community's services. The Federation is also a source of data and policy information for the development of prevention strategies in the region.In 2016 the programme of work includes the expansion of the web-based training course, the development of a scholarship programme for lower-income Member States, the development of a suite of downloadable graphics on prevalence and inequalities in English and five other EU languages, updating the interactive maps and developing an Atlas and set of Country Record Cards. These activities support the Community’s 3rd Health Programme, Specific Objective 1 for cost effective disease prevention (including: good practices for disease prevention and health promotion) and Specific Objective 3 for building health systems (including: cross-border expertise and public health interventions and prevention strategies).
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ERN-RND is a network of 32 Healthcare Providers from 13 EU member states. ERN-RDN builds on existing expert centres and mature networks dedicated to rare neurological diseases (RND) as well as established rare disease infrastructures such as Orphanet, EURORDIS and RD-Connect. Through coordination and knowledge transfer, ERN-RND shall establish a patient-centred network to address the needs of patients with RND of all age groups, with or without a definite diagnosis, by implementing an infrastructure for diagnosis, evidence-based management, treatment and collection of patient data. The network will develop, disseminate, implement and supervise best practice guidelines and care pathways to optimize patient care and facilitate training and capacity building in the field. A special effort will be aimed to member states with less developed infrastructure for caring for RND patients, where no current partners are located, or with only affiliated or collaborative partners. ERN-RND will inform planning of European and national health care in RND, facilitating translation of research activities into clinical practice and the development of future therapies. Keeping in line with ERN-RND’s strategic objectives the six most important operational targets for year 1 will be:
• Kick ERN-RND off through a highly engaging kick-off meeting involving all stakeholders,
• Establish operability of all governance bodies as well as operational bodies such as working groups and disease expert groups,
• Establish and disseminate access points for all ERN-RND HCPs and pilot E-Health virtual consultation platform as ERN-RND access point for external clinicians and patients
• Consent and disseminate diagnostic flowcharts for all RND covered by ERN-RND
• Identify most important care needs for RND and design high impact strategies to address these needs
• Build ERN-RND web-site as THE RND information hub
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ERN-RND is a network of 32 Healthcare Providers from 13 EU member states. ERN-RDN builds on existing expert centres and mature networks dedicated to rare neurological diseases (RND) as well as established rare disease infrastructures such as Orphanet, EURORDIS and RD-Connect. Through coordination and knowledge transfer, ERN-RND shall establish a patient-centred network to address the needs of patients with RND of all age groups, with or without a definite diagnosis, by implementing an infrastructure for diagnosis, evidence-based management, treatment and collection of patient data. The network will develop, disseminate, implement and supervise best practice guidelines and care pathways to optimize patient care and facilitate training and capacity building in the field. A special effort will be aimed to member states with less developed infrastructure for caring for RND patients, where no current partners are located, or with only affiliated or collaborative partners. ERN-RND will inform planning of European and national health care in RND, facilitating translation of research activities into clinical practice and the development of future therapies. Keeping in line with ERN-RND’s strategic objectives the six most important operational targets for year 2 are:
• Introduction of CPMS in ERN-RND for e-consultation of clinical cases
• Consensus on disease group specific care quality indicators
• Consensus on diagnostic flowcharts for all RND covered by ERN-RND
• Identify disease groups specific most important care needs for RND in the EU
• Establish ERN-RND web-site as THE RND information hub and use it as the core of a ERN-RND information strategy
• Define minimum quality and interoperability criteria for RND registries

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ERN-RITA brings together the leading European centres with expertise in diagnosis and treatment of rare primary immunodeficiency, autoimmune and autoinflammatory disorders, setting the stage for high standards of clinical care throughout Europe enabling centres of excellence to drive forward this pan-European initiative. Our network combines concerted efforts to improve patient care across Europe, and in particular enables patients in less well served countries to have access to the same high standards of care. Rare immunological disorders are life-threatening conditions requiring multidisciplinary care using complex diagnostic evaluation and highly specialised cutting edge therapies. The constituent groups brought together in RITA provide an exemplar of what has and can be achieved with rare diseases over time. Our groups from across Europe have already clearly demonstrated the ability to work together for the benefit of patients by constructing registries, surveying treatments and outcomes, conducting clinical research and devising guidelines for best practice which have been shown to improve outcomes. With the creation of our network we provide an opportunity for these excellent initiatives to be shared equitably all over Europe, as RITA will harmonize diagnostic and therapeutic guidelines and thus provide a common shared medical platform for all affected patients, independent of national and ethnic origins. The RITA network aims at harmonizing diagnostic and therapeutic guidelines for all affected patients, independent of national and ethnic origins, resulting in access to diagnostic tests and therapies such as biologic therapies, Immunoglobulin replacement, stem cell transplantation, and gene therapy. RITA members believe that, by improving understanding and awareness, diagnosis of these diseases, facilitating advances in treatment and educating physicians about these diseases, will ensure that every patient will benefit from clinical and scientific knowledge.
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