Soros Foundation Moldova (FSM)

Grant competition

DEADLINE EXTENSION – OCTOBER 31st, 2013

Background

Legal, ethical, and human rights norms are increasingly important  in delivery of quality medical care. The concept of human rights in patient care brings together the rights of both patients and health care providers and refers to the application of general human rights principles to all stakeholders in the delivery of health care. The Open Society Foundations’ (OSF) work on behalf of society’s most marginalized persons—people living with HIV or TB, people in need of palliative care, ethnic minorities, sexual or gender minorities, people who use drugs, and people with intellectual disabilities or mental health problems—has shown that health systems can too often be places of punishment, coercion, and violations of basic rights to consent and confidentiality, rather than places of treatment and care. 

There is an urgent need to support legal and administrative remedies for individual and systemic human rights abuses in health care settings, and at the same time establish non-punitive mechanisms of incorporating normative principles into patient care.  Law reform is necessary in some areas, and where laws which have the potential to address pervasive violations exist they must be effectively enforced.  Legal and human rights practitioners are either not trained for representing victims of human rights abuses in health care or may lack knowledge of the human rights aspects of diverse statutory and regulatory provisions applicable to patients and health care providers. At the same time, doctors and other health practitioners are often unaware of their rights and legal obligations as providers and lack understanding of the human rights aspects of health care provision.  At the same time, doctors and other health practitioners are often unaware of their rights and legal obligations as providers and lack understanding of the human rights aspects of health care provision.  Patients, too, are frequently unaware of their rights. 

To address this gap, OSF’s Law and Health Initiative, Human Rights Initiative, in partnership with Soros Foundation-Moldova, have supported the development of a series of resources, including:

• Practitioner Guide for lawyers and human rights practitioners interested in taking human rights in patient care cases.  This is a practical, how-to manual, covering both litigation and alternative mechanisms such as ombudspersons and medical licensing bodies.  Patient and provider rights and responsibilities and procedures for protection at national, regional, and international levels are examined in the Practitioner Guide.
• The Health and Human Rights Resource Guide (available at:  http://equalpartners.info/), which includes fact sheets, program descriptions, jurisprudence, case studies, bibliographies, and glossary definitions on seven areas of health and human rights:  patient care, HIV/AIDS, harm reduction, palliative care, sexual health, minority health, and mental health.  The Resource Guide is designed to support health and human rights advocacy, training, education, programming, and grant making. 

The call for proposals

The current grant competition will provide support to a lead NGO to work in partnership with other organizations and experts to use the above resources to coordinate an initiative aimed at effective enforcement of human rights standards in patient care through targeted activities.

The goal of this initiative is to advance enforcement of human rights in patient care, particularly for marginalized groups, by translating laws and procedures into practical terms for legal practitioners, health care providers, and patients.  This initiative additionally aims to build the field of human rights in patient care through the development of case law, published writing, leadership, and networks.

Soros Foundation-Moldova, OSF’ Law and Health Initiative and Human Rights Initaive are pleased to announce a competition for a one-year grant to an NGO active in Law, Human Rights and Patient Care fields.

The one-year grant to be awarded aims to contribute to the development of a new generation of lawyers with expertise in human rights and patient care, increase the capacity of local NGOs, and build this field through trainings and the development of materials and networks.

Project proposals should include the following components:

1) Situation Analysis

Please articulate the problems this project aims to address and the main barriers to using the law to advance human rights in patient care for marginalized groups in your country.  Please reflect on the following:

• What is the extent of enforcement of patients’ rights protections in Moldova, particularly among marginalized groups such as people living with HIV or TB, people in need of palliative care, people with intellectual disabilities or mental health problems, sexual or gender minorities and people who use drugs?
• What is the capacity of the legal profession in Moldova to enforce these laws through litigation and legal services?
• What is the level of awareness among health care providers of their human rights obligations towards their patients and of their own human rights in the delivery of health care?
• What is the level of awareness of human rights among patients, particularly patients from marginalized groups?
• To what extent is information about patients’ rights available and used over the Internet?

 2) Organizational Background

Please provide background information on your organization. 

• How does this project fit into your organization’s mission, and what has been your previous experience with human rights in patient care? 
• Please describe your organization’s previous experience with the Practitioner Guide, Health and Human Rights Resource Guide, and health and human rights trainings.  What activities have you completed so far, and what additional do you plan to complete before September 2012? 
• Please list the donors currently supporting your work.

3) Patient-Friendly Materials Focused on Marginalized Populations

As part of this project, do you propose to develop patient friendly materials on human rights in patient care focused on marginalized groups (people living with HIV or TB, people in need of palliative care, ethnic minorities, sexual or gender minorities, people who use drugs, and people with intellectual disabilities or mental health problems)?  If so, with which group(s) do you intend to collaborate, and what gaps and needs will these materials address? 

4) Networking and Dissemination

This proposal supports a lead NGO to work in partnership with other organizations.  How do you plan to collaborate with other organizations working in the health and human rights field in your country?

How do you propose to disseminate the Practitioner Guide, patient-friendly materials, and Health and Human Rights Resource Guide?  How do you propose to increase traffic to the web site?  Please be creative!  For instance, you may want to have these materials endorsed by national bar associations, reviewed in professional journals, placed in hospital lobbies, made available in libraries, and distributed by CD at relevant conferences.  Links to the webs site can be placed on postcards, stationary, and pens. 

5) Trainings

Please propose a training plan for the year, using the Practitioner Guide, patient friendly materials, and Health and Human Rights Resource Guide.

• How will each proposed training address the problem and barriers described in your “situations analysis” above?
• For each training event, who is the audience, and who are the trainers?  What are the goals, topics, and teaching methodologies? 
• Please explain how participants will be selected for each training. 
• How will these trainings benefit marginalized populations?
• Please explain how you will evaluate each of the training sessions.
• Please describe the practical follow-up you plan for the trainings.  How will you keep in touch with participants and ensure the trainings contribute to enforcement of human rights in patient care?

6) Budget

 Please provide a detailed budget covering costs of this project.

7) Monitoring and Evaluation

What do you hope to achieve with respect to enforcement of human rights in patient care, particularly for marginalized groups, in your country?  How do the project activities support these goals?  How can this link be detected, and what indicators will you use to measure progress?

8) Project period

The project implementation period - 12 months.

Grant application (in English) must include

• Project proposal (Paragraph II from the Guide of solicitant for funding)
• Budget (should include a breakdown of the costs to operate the service, including staff and the percentage of their time spent (25%, 50%, etc) working in the service, funded from this project
• Proofs of co-funding contributions from other organizations (should include the funding support from institutions for in-kind support, and partial salary support)
• Other relevant documents (Paragraph I from the Guide of solicitant for funding).

A guide for project proposals application can be downloaded here: 

http://www.soros.md/files/Ghidul%20solicitantului%20de%20finantare_2013.pdf

The budget form can be downloaded here: http://www.soros.md/documents

Proposal Review and Evaluation

Each proposal will be reviewed and evaluated independently. The final decision will be issued by the Public Health Program sub-Board/Soros Foundation Moldova Board, based on OSF’s Law and Health Initiative and Human Rights Initiative recommendations.

Deadline

The deadline for proposals submission has been extended.

Project proposals and supporting documents must be received no later than 17:00 on October 31st, 2013 by e-mail at foundation@soros.md or in hard copy at the following address: 32, Bulgara Street, MD-2001, Chisinau (Soros – Moldova Foundation). In subject area, please mention “PG implementation”.