Abstract
: The disease burden for migrant populations has shifted from infectious conditions to non-communicable diseases (NCDs) in recent years. Migrants are among the most disproportionally affected by NCDs nowadays in Europe, where often they take risky jobs, increasing their morbidity and mortality. This concern along with population aging challenges health systems’ responsiveness and sustainability. The determinants behind health disparity among migrants are well-documented and include poorer socioeconomic conditions, barriers in health services access, and difficulties in adoption of healthy behaviors related to new sociocultural contexts and environmental hazards. This calls for attention to improved disease prevention, management and treatment tailored to migrants’ needs. In Europe, little is known about NCDs prevention and management needs among migrants and how to address them. This workshop aims to provide a comprehensive overview of innovative approaches tackling these issues and derive implications for creating interventions and policies to effectively prevent and support management of NCDs among migrants, fostering positive health and wellbeing. The workshop will do that by sharing experiences of existing interventions, discussing solutions to the development of culturally adapted strategies and reflecting on opportunities for translation of practice into policy involving four panelists with expertise from diverse backgrounds. The workshop will start with a general overview of the NCDs disparities among migrant populations and the importance of evidence-based public health approaches to promote NCDs prevention and management. A specific look will be drawn to challenges in preventing chronic work-related diseases in migrant workers. Then experiences of interventions focused on NCDs prevention and management targeting migrants will be presented, sharing best practices on how to address health disparities and develop effective solutions, harnessing lessons from the field. An open dialogue between panelists and the audience will follow, aimed to provide new perspectives on the topic, identify further relevant questions, discuss common challenges associated with developing tailored interventions for NCDs prevention and management and reflect on strategies to solve those challenges, that often demand creative, collaborative and transdisciplinary work and partnerships. The workshop will conclude with a summary and closing remarks. The workshop seeks to foster exchange of knowledge on the opportunities for, and challenges in, developing culturally adapted, acceptable and sustained interventions for NCDs prevention and management, that effectively address migrants’ needs, promote health equity and inform public health policies. The goal is to equip participants with a comprehensive understanding of the importance of tackling NCDs determinants of health disparity and inspire collaborative action towards effective health promotion and wellbeing. KEY MESSAGES: • Addressing non-communicable diseases among migrants requires innovative, culturally adapted interventions and evidence-informed policies to promote health equity. • The workshop will highlight best practices and collaborative strategies for NCDs prevention and management, to inspire public health actions and policy development tailored to migrant populations.