From 12 to 14 August 2026, the 35th International Forum of the Organization for Health Excellence (OES) brought together healthcare professionals and leaders in Cartagena de Indias, Colombia, to exchange experiences and perspectives on quality of care, innovation, patient safety and person-centred healthcare.
CARAMEL was represented by project partner Keralty-Colombia, whose team presented the Successful Experience “Women’s Voices as Evidence: Transforming Cardiovascular Health During Menopause Through Multidisciplinary Co-Creation Processes.” Presented by Sandra Katherine Forero and Paula Andrea González on 13 August, the contribution was selected as a conference for the Person-Centered Care – Patient Experience thematic line.
The presentation shared work developed within CARAMEL-WOMEN, the project’s mixed-method study designed to understand women’s experiences, needs and expectations around menopause and cardiovascular health, and to translate these insights into requirements for CARAMEL’s digital solutions.
One of the key messages emerging from the work is that cardiovascular prevention during the menopausal transition requires an approach that takes into account women’s lived experiences alongside clinical knowledge. Women involved in the study described how physical and emotional changes associated with menopause can overshadow concerns about cardiovascular health. The findings also highlighted gaps in how cardiovascular risk is perceived, while healthcare professionals identified opportunities to strengthen prevention and pointed to limited consultation time and fragmented care as barriers.
These insights fed directly into CARAMEL’s international co-creation process, led by Trinity College Dublin (TCD): four iterative workshops were conducted in each of seven participating settings across Ireland, Greece, Croatia, Lithuania, Colombia and Spain (in Andalusia and the Basque Country) for a total of 28 sessions. Women and healthcare professionals explored different aspects of the digital solution, including information needs and sources, language, colours, iconography, content, navigation and overall user experience. Their feedback also helped identify areas for improvement in advanced prototypes, supporting the development of solutions intended to be clear, credible, inclusive and useful in real-life contexts.
This co-creation work has also contributed to the development of the CARAMEL CVD Prevention Portal, made publicly available in July 2026 at www.menopauseandheart.eu. The Portal provides women with an accessible digital space dedicated to menopause and cardiovascular health, bringing together evidence-based information and prevention resources shaped by the needs and preferences identified through the project’s engagement activities.
Presenting this experience within the OES Forum’s person-centred care track was particularly relevant for CARAMEL. Co-creation is a core approach in the project, helping ensure that the tools being developed reflect the lived experiences, priorities and needs of the women they are intended to support.
The Forum also provided an opportunity to bring CARAMEL’s approach into a broader conversation on healthcare quality and patient experience in Colombia. By sharing lessons from CARAMEL-WOMEN, Keralty helped reinforce a central principle of the project: meaningful digital health solutions for women should be developed with women, placing their voices at the heart of the design process.
