We are very happy to officially announce that Mater Dei Hospital from Malta is now a VASCERN Affiliated Partner!
This National Coordination Hub is represented by Dr. Maryanne Caruana, cardiologist, and Professor Kevin Cassar, Vascular Surgeon, who will share their expertise with the Heritable Thoracic Aortic Diseases Working Group (HTAD WG) and the Medium-Sized Arteries Working Group (MSA WG).
Dr. Maryanne Caruana was present at VASCERN Days 2019 in Brussels where she had a chance to meet everyone in our network and start collaborating with the other members of the HTAD WG. She has equally started participating in the HTAD WG monthly meetings and will be attending the HTAD WG face-to-face meeting which will take place this year in Paris.
Professor Cassar will attend the monthly MSA-WG meetings and has been invited to the MSA WG face-to-face meeting that will also occur in Paris this year.
As a reminder, the designation of “Affiliated Partner” to the ERN was integrated into the ERN legal framework in order to “achieve the widest possible geographical coverage, exchange of knowledge and best practice throughout Europe.”
Affiliated Partners are named by their national governments.
There are 2 types of Affiliated Partners:
- Associated National Centres (mainly healthcare providers) for those ERNs where an EU Member State is not yet represented by a full member in the respective ERN. It establishes a link with one specific ERN.
- A National Coordination Hub which establishes at once a link with more than one Network in which a given Member State is neither represented by a full member nor by an Associated National Centre. National Coordination Hubs may especially represent a useful solution for those Member States with very small populations that need to establish such links with many ERNs at once.
For all documents related to Affiliated Partners see the ERN Board of Member States (BoMS) page here
See the complete list of VASCERN’s full Healthcare Provider members and Affiliated Partners here
Stay tuned as our network continues to grow!