New Nordic research programme on health and welfare NordForsk is launching a Nordic research programme in the area of health and welfare. The objective is to increase knowledge about health and welfare in the Nordic countries. – We want to view health and welfare in a broad perspective, says Gunnel Gustafsson, Director of NordForsk. – If we look at the concept of welfare from a Nordic vantage point, it entails not only welfare and unemployment benefits, but education and the labour market as well, she says. – The new programme on health and welfare will consist of several different research activities. NordForsk will begin by launching two initiatives: Distribution of health and welfare and user-driven innovation within health and welfare. – We plan to expand the programme by adding more thematic areas over time, explains Dr Gustafsson. Distribution of health and welfare The reasons that health and welfare are unequally distributed throughout society are complex. Gender, age, socioeconomic status, and ethnic and geographical background are all fairly influential factors. – We need to strengthen and intensify Nordic research in the area to understand why the distribution of health and welfare in the Nordic region remains unequal, says Dr Gustafsson. – Under a joint Nordic initiative researchers can utilise large data sets, which in
turn will enhance scientific quality. This is where the efforts related to joint Nordic registry data play a critical role. Access to such data, together with the Nordic countries’ strong research tradition in the area of health and welfare, will give this programme a competitive advantage internationally. In addition, a focus on health and welfare technology and on intervention studies will have an impact on the distribution of health and welfare. Health innovation centred around the user The other thematic area under the programme is user-driven innovation in the health field. Enormous potential lies in enhancing the efficiency of the health sector. This may entail developing advanced medical technology or discovering weaknesses in the areas of overlap between various health and welfare systems. User-driven innovation is based on the needs of users and seeks to find new solutions to their problems. Background of the programme The Nordic countries already hold a leading position or have the potential to benefit from greater Nordic cooperation in all of the thematic areas under the health and welfare programme. The programme has been established on the basis of reports on Nordic research cooperation from the working groups NORIA-net on Health and Welfare and NORIA-net on Sport Sciences.
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