Health Indicators in the European Union transforming health data to health information ECHIM Joint Action Jürgen Thelen EHIS Workshop

ECHI in the HMP Health Monitoring Programme (98-03): Objective: to establish a coherent approach for health monitoring including a set of health indicators for the EU,  to monitor health trends  to enable for comparisons between countries  to support health policies (EU, national, regional) ECHI projects (European Community Health Indicators) –ECHI-1: ; ECHI-2: –15 EU-MS, WHO, OECD, Eurostat, Coordination RIVM, Netherlands

ECHI Indicators: selection criteria ECHI-1: structured long list, over 200 indicators Criteria: 1.Cover the entire public health field 2.Meet user needs: serve policy actions for MS, EU 3.Use earlier work of international institutions, but also allow for innovations ECHI-2: Shortlist for priority implementation Selection by PH generalists; extra criteria: Viewpoint of the ‘general public health official’ (‘cockpit’) Focus on the large public health problems and inequalities And on the large possibilities for improvement

Impact of ECHI ECHI Shortlist became important element in SANCO documents, e.g. annual work plans, the Health Strategy ECHI Shortlist specifies many indicators from EHIS ECHI shortlist is a guiding principle in the Eurostat directive on PH data delivery by the Member States DG SANCO started web publication of data for shortlist Member States are using ECHI for their national monitoring strategies

Follow-up by ECHIM-1 ECHIM (ECHI-Monitoring) –Coordinated by KTL, Finland; 11 Member States, WHO,Eurostat, Working Party Indicators (all MS) Main results –Set of documentation sheets for shortlist indicators (definitions, data sources, synergy with other indicator sets) –Availability assessment of the of data (Int. DB, MS) –Network of indicators experts in almost all EU MS –Website project results (

ECHIM Joint Action participation of MS more important than ever Basics –Initiated by SANCO as a ‘Joint Action’ with the member States –Coordinated by THL, Finland (A. Aromaa), Core Group of 10 countries; working forum with remaining Member States to be established (Extended Core Group) Main areas of work –Finalisation of indicator development and documentation: work with Eurostat and other expert parties (e.g. European Health Interview Survey; morbidity programme; networks for cancer and perinatal health, etc.) –Implementation of shortlist indicators in the Member States: further assessment of data availability, implementation plans, gather crucial stakeholders and initiate national activities –Describe data flow, perform a pilot for data collection and reporting; with data from international databases and directly from the MS

ECHI needs EHIS ECHIM specifies EHIS as favorite data source for 20 ECHI-Indicators in various sections Health determinants e.g. -Smoking, Alcohol, Fruit/Vegetable consumption Health Status e.g. –Prevalence of selected conditions (e.g. Asthma, Diabetes, COPD) Health care utilisation e.g. –Consultations (Physicians, Specialists, others) Background variables provide information for stratified analysis –By age, sex, education, income, occupational status

The way forward ECHIM prefers the originally proposed indicators for ECHI Indicators provided that they are valid for cross-country comparisons applicable in population based health interview surveys ECHI will be adapted according to the results of the EHIS revision ECHI Presentation Tool at SANCO (Eurostat plans?) htm Way forward

Thank you for your attention! Contact: Jürgen Thelen Robert Koch Institute Mail: ECHIM-Products website: ECHIM-Project website: