Eurocarers
European association working for carers
PflegeWiki
Summary
PflegeWiki is a website inspired by Wikipedia, providing information exclusively on care-related issues. Informal carers can use PflegeWiki to find comprehensive information on diverse care issues, such as diseases, medication or therapies. They can also write relevant articles themselves.
PflegeWiki currently publishes more than 6137 articles on diverse care issues written by volunteers (e.g. students, formal and informal carers).
Information is also available in English. Furthermore, there is an Italian version of PflegeWiki provided by a cooperating organisation (http://www.nursepedia.net/).
The website contains information on how to use PflegeWiki and how to write articles.
The service, privately funded by charitable donations and membership fees, is free of charge for users. The main beneficiaries are care recipients and all people involved in caring tasks: informal and formal carers and students. The yearly membership fee is 6€ for individuals, 4€ for students and apprentices and 10€ for registered associations.
No particular digital skills are needed in order to access the service. It is sufficient to have a personal computer and an Internet connection.
Public social services and healthcare organizations as well as private care organizations are involved in the PflegeWiki, in addition to professionals interested in contributing and writing articles.
The initiative has a positive impact particularly at the micro level, as it provides information and learning for carers, while at the macro level, it avoids hospitalisation and institutionalisation of older people, by improving the quality of care.
Description
refers to the target users, kind of service provided, ICTs typologies and devices used
The initiative aims to provide a database for carers on issues such as diseases, therapies and medications, free of charge and open to the public, in order to help carers manage their caring, to share their experiences, and to prevent social isolation.
PflegeWiki provides information on caring free of charge and open to the public as well as the opportunity to participate writing articles and sharing experiences. It aims to ease the burden of informal and formal caregivers, and not least support the quality of informal care to support care recipients, who are thus indirectly also well affected by the service.
Care Recipients
Informal carers
Paid assistants
Formal carers
Not available
Independent Living
Information and learning for carers
Personal Support and Social Integration for carer
Care coordination
Living independently for care recipients, information for formal and informal carers.
The basic devices required are a PC and an Internet connection.
Operational Information
refers to the type of funding, budget, sustainability and organisations involved
Not applicable
The initiative is funded by membership fees and charitable donations.
Private out of pocket: users pay for the service through a membership fee. The service provided is free of charge. The yearly membership fee is 6€ for individuals, 4€ for students and apprentices and 10€ for registered associations.
Non-profit funding: charity, volunteers organisations, NGO.
The initiative targets anyone concerned with or interested in care issues such as students, formal and informal carers. Its purpose is to help find information on diseases, therapies, medications or other carers personal experiences. The initiative could also be interesting for people who would like participate by joining the association, writing articles or recount their experiences.
The initiative has a board of members.
There is no information on planned trading practices, and operational processes.
Since the service is no longer in operation, there is no sustainability plan or any planned change of its provision. However, on the main website page, administrators are willing to open it again as 99% of users are asking for it.
Not available
Authorities
Private Care Sector
Health and Social Care Systems
Third Sector
Private Companies
Not available
Informal Carers
Health Professionals
Social Care Professionals
Privately-Hired Care Assistants (inc. Migrant Care Workers)
Volunteers
The service does not have employees, because professionals act as volunteers, uploading articles and documents to the website. Additional information will be available after an update.
Volunteers (students, formal and informal carers) publish articles. There is no information available on the recruitment system.
Not available
The main communication channel is the website.
Evaluation
refers to the impact of the service on end-users, care organisations and authorities
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The service benefits carers’ quality of life, allowing to access information and to share their experiences. The service indirectly benefits care recipients’ quality of life, by positively impacting the quality of their care (Schmidt et al., 2011). |
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The service has a positive impact on:
- Private organisations that provide care, providing information and training for formal and informal carers and optimising resources.
- Companies and the labour market, as it trains working carers and allows them to learn about care issues without leaving the working place (Schmidt et al., 2011).
The service helps the National Health System because it increases the skills of informal carers, and indirectly, avoids hospitalisations and saves the costs of home caring (Schmidt et al., 2011).
Strengths:
- Easy and quick access to articles, as they are divided into sections according to their themes.
- The website offers a discussion section.
Weaknesses:
- Further information on its last closed version (budget, evaluation, problems in developing the initiative as well as future perspectives), hopefully will be updated.
- The service is only available in read-only mode.
Opportunities:
- The initiative received a lot of support from their users: 99% of them requested to re-open it.
Threats/challenges:
- The main challenge is opening the service again.
- Providing a service evaluation.
Launched in 2004, the initiative has been scaled up insofar as it has been officially operated by an association to facilitate free information exchange on caring (Verein zur Förderung Freier Informationen für die Pflege e.V.) founded in 2005. In 2006 it expanded to the NursingWiki-Family containing English and Italian versions of the website provided by an initiative cooperating with PflegeWiki.
No further development is planned in the near future as the service has been closed even though administrators are trying to reopen it.
More Information
includes contacts, publications and accompanying documents
References:
Schmidt A., Chiatti C., Fry G., Hanson E., Magnusson L,. Socci M, Stückler A., Széman Z., Barbabella F., Hoffmann F. & Lamura G. (2011), Analysis and Mapping of 52 ICT based Initiatives for Caregivers, http://is.jrc.ec.europa.eu/pages/EAP/eInclusion/carers.html
Publications:
Nursepedia: l'enciclopedia degli infermieri, on http://www.nursepedia.net/, (last access: June 2013)
Kluzer S., Redecker C., Centeno C. (2010) Long-term Care Challenges in an Ageing Society: The Role of ICT and Migrants. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union.
Not available