The European Reference Networks are set out
in Article 12 of the Cross Border Healthcare Directive which was set to be
implemented by Member States by October of last year, with limited success.
 The goal of ERNs is to establish voluntary networks for healthcare
professionals improve care. To qualify, ERNs must fulfil three of the following
criteria:
- to help realise the potential of European
cooperation regarding highly specialised healthcare for patients and for
healthcare systems by exploiting innovations in medical science and health
technologies;
- to contribute to the pooling of knowledge
regarding sickness prevention;
- to facilitate improvements in diagnosis
and the delivery of high-quality, accessible and cost-effective healthcare
for all patients with a medical condition requiring a particular
concentration of expertise in medical domains where expertise is rare;
- to maximise the cost-effective use of
resources by concentrating them where appropriate;
- to reinforce research, epidemiological
surveillance like registries and provide training for health
professionals;
- to facilitate mobility of expertise,
virtually or physically, and to develop, share and spread information,
knowledge and best practice and to foster developments of the diagnosis
and treatment of rare diseases, within and outside the networks;
- to encourage the development of quality
and safety benchmarks and to help develop and spread best practice within
and outside the network;
- to help Member States with an
insufficient number of patients with a particular medical condition or
lacking technology or expertise to provide highly specialised services of
high quality.
Despite the degree of flexibility in what areas an ERN can target
set out the in Cross-Border Healthcare Directive, Annex I of the Delegated Act
is much more restrictive. A successful Network must: “provide highly
specialized healthcare for rare or low prevalence complex diseases or
conditions”.
This would indicate highly preferential treatment
to rare diseases as a low prevalence seems to be an essential requirement.
 This delegated and implementing act goes on to set out the specifics of
the selection of ERNs and the conditions that healthcare professionals wishing
to join must fulfil. While the sections on applying healthcare professionals
are largely related to their qualifications there are a few key points that
members of VPH must note with regard to applying:
- On 28 May 2016, a call for expression of
interest to establish an ERN must be published by the Commission which
will invite interested candidates to apply;
- Any group of at least 10 healthcare
providers established in at least 8 Member States may apply;
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- While a European Commission sanctioned
group will assess the value of an application it is the “Board of Member
States” which has the ultimate decision on whether or not to establish a
network;
- Frequent assessments of the added value
of the networks are envisaged;
The full text of the Delegated Act and
Implementing Act can be found here
and here.
