Work of the country coordinators

The last few months have been a busy period on the MARQuIS Project for the country co-ordinators, as the project moves into the implementation phase for the questionnaire on hospital quality initiatives and how these help to meet the needs of cross-border patients. The questionnaire aims to gain responses from a wide sample of hospitals with over 100 beds, in eight countries.

There is a country co-ordinator for each country (and two for Belgium). The main task to date for the country co-ordinators has been enlisting participation from hospitals in each project country and liaison with the project team. Over 1,200 letters of invitation to join the project were sent out by country co-ordinators. At the end of January 155 hospitals had been recruited, with follow-ups and further information from country co-ordinators this had risen to 457 by mid-March. It is hoped that over 600 hospitals in total will complete the questionnaire during this phase of the MARQuIS project. The response to MARQuIS from hospitals has varied from country to country, dependent upon a range of factors, such as endorsement from national bodies, the situation of the national health economy, attitudes to Europe-wide projects and so forth. In some countries hospitals have responded very positively, whereas in others it has been more of a challenge to engage commitment to the project.

Country co-ordinators have also had to translate the project information and the questionnaire and instructions, so that all the necessary information is available in each of the six languages. The questionnaire is being completed on-line, so country co-ordinators have had to ensure that there is an accurate e-mail address for each participating hospital. Having recruited the hospitals, the next task is now to ensure that as many questionnaires as possible are completed. Country co-ordinators will get a country up-date to show which of their national participants have completed the questionnaire. They will then be following up and encouraging all project leads at the other participating hospitals to complete the questionnaire by the project deadline of 15 May 2006.