empirica Projekte zum Thema Digitale Integration & Barrierefreiheit

P.A.U. Education and Atos Origin, a worldwide leading IT actor, teamed-up to lead the further maintenance and upgrading of the successful ePractice.eu internet portal. ePractice is a knowledge sharing community for eServices like eGovernment, eHealth and eInclusion. The project leaders are supported by empirica in the improvement of the user experience. Empirica analyses usage statistics and user interaction, using innovative methods such as click heatmaps and view port analysis. In addition, empirica supports P.A.U and Atos in improving the page for disabled users with the aim to comply with the W3Cs Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0. empirica gives recommendations and guidance to web developers and content producers in identifying best practices and involving disabled users.

Project website: www.epractice.eu

The project defines, delivers and pilots a digital infrastructure supporting coordinated cross-sector delivery of timely support to prevent older people from slipping out of safe independent living, maintaining quality of life. The infrastructure enables support services to overcome limitations of sectoral telehealth and telecare and empowers informal carers and the voluntary / third sector to participate in delivery of support, thus radically improving efficiency. The innovative new services are piloted at six sites across the Europe. The project brings together 20 organisations across 6 Member States representing all major stakeholders in the "value chain" of support to older people, from public authorities and social and health service providers to global industry players and specialist SMEs.

More information and project website: http://www.independent-project.eu/

The study covers the second phase of the EuroFound initiative on "company initiatives for workers with care responsibilities for disabled children or adults". The first phase had already been carried out by empirica together with the Work Research Centre, Dublin. The study reviews recent research and policy documents from Member States, selecting 20-25 of the most important to be summarised in an Annotated Bibliography, apply the framework designed for documentation of policy/service developments in six Member States excluding those countries covered in the first phase (Germany, the UK, the Netherlands and Ireland), describe and assess company case studies of good practice in the six Member States, following the template drawn up in the first phase of the project, organise and finance a small Expert Workshop, to debate the findings of the research. Like in the first phase the focus of this study is on company initiatives for workers with care responsibilities for disabled children or adults. The project covers several European countries and are supported by experts and national correspondents from empirica's ENIR network..

The results of the project have been published on the European Foundation's website, see http://www.eurofound.europa.eu/areas/populationandsociety/workingcaring/search.php

Against the background of the fact that the use of telemedicine services is still limited and the market for devices remains highly fragmented, despite the potential benefits and the technical maturity of many applications, the study explores the European space in terms of the deployment of ICT-enabled care services, to learn from successful examples, and to adapt policies and incentive structures. In an effort to address these needs, the study demonstrates the gains in promoting the de-ployment of home care services using ICT and facilitate the exchange of good practices. The study develops the following key outputs: a consistent, rigorous, and realistic conceptual and methodological design of the study, including clustering of models of long-term care, a choice of 10 national cases, and the structure of a scoreboard on innovation, a scoreboard on the openness to innovation of national models of long-term care in the area of ICT-enabled home care services, set up around a set of macro-categories related to the openness to innovation, a validation workshop of one day, informing relevant stakeholders and experts about, and collecting their views on the interim study findings, as well as more general views, especially on current and future developments in the area of the study and policy implications, a set of analysed good practices in innovative, ICT-enabled of home care services for older people with chronic diseases, covering all six macro-categories of the scoreboard, and several clusters of national long-term care models, a set of relevant, well grounded, and clear policy recommendations, supporting further policy developments at European level to promote the deployment of ICT-enabled home care services, their ongoing monitoring, and the exchange and transferability of good practices across Europe, and adequate promotion of the main findings of the study. The project covers all EU Member States with more intensive activities in 10 countries to be supported by experts and national correspondents from empirica's ENIR network (www.enir.org) in the different countries.

The main goal of the ICT+Ageing study is to identify and understand the market barriers which currently hinder uptake of ICT for independent living and active ageing in Europe. The study seeks to contribute towards policy action which will effectively tackle existing barriers, thereby helping to unleash ICT's potential to contribute to Europe's capacity for dealing with the demographic challenge.

The study focuses on three application areas of ICT for active ageing: Independent living (ageing well at home), Employment (Active ageing at work) and Social Participation (Ageing well in the community). A horizontal topic of core interest are the ethical issues arising from the use of ICT for purposes related to active ageing.

The study looks into the situation in 14 EU Member States plus USA and Japan with regard to market structures, recent and emerging developments, and policy response. It will identify and analyse good practice and show how Europe can learn from the experience in individual countries.

On the basis of the analysis, recommendations for action are to be developed in order to remove barriers for uptake and to foster market development. The results of the study will also guide the way towards further research needs in this area.

Project Outline June 2008

eAccessbility is commonly understood as a means to ensure that Information and Communication Technology products and services meet the requirements of people with disabilities. Accessible ICTs will improve the quality of life of people with disabilities significantly. At the same time, the lack of equal opportunities to access ICT can lead to exclusion. In the recent Communication on eAccessibility, the European Commission (CEC) presents approaches to ensure the availability of accessible ICT-based devices and services throughout the European Union. Three key approaches for EU-level policy intervention are highlighted:

• the application of accessibility requirements in public procurement (utilising freedoms given to Member States in transposing the Public Procurement Directive),
• the introduction of a product and service certification scheme and
• making better use of existing legislation e.g. in telecommunications and employment.

The approach outlined in the Communication is to be reviewed within two years, and new measures and - if deemed necessary - new legislation then to be proposed. MeAC is expected to provide both qualitative and quantitative evidence to support this policy decision making.
The study will

• identify, throughout the EU and elsewhere, legislative and other policy measures and actions by industry and other actor groupings that have or potentially can have a significant positive impact on eAccessibility and that support the Community eAccessibility strategy;
• assess to what extent ICT products and services available in Europe take into account eAccessibility requirements and Design for All principles, to what extent the opportunities offered by assistive technologies are being capitalised on and to assess the impact on costs of accessible and assistive ICT products and services;
• measure a change over time by assessing the eAccessibility situation in Europe at two points in time and in this way to measure progress, quantifying the impact of the three approaches specified in the Communication;
• identify cases of policy good practice by assessing the implementation of successful measures and drawing up recommendations for EU policy development in the eAccessibility domain.

In methodological regard, the study will in addition rely upon a policy survey, comprehensive literature anaylsis and on field studies in the EU Member States, USA, Canada and Australia.