The positive experience of the HCCP Project, at its natural end, and the years of the Covid pandemic, have generated the conception of the new VHC Project, funded by the Erasmus+ 2022 Program.

Virtual Healthcare Clown project is a Cooperation Partnership in the field of Vocational Education and Training aimed at producing a digitally focused syllabus and co-designed procedures, tools and competences in order to adapt “Healthcare Clowns” Organisations in Europe to the needs and conditions of the labour market and to increase attractiveness of VET.

VHC will be implemented during a period of 24 months (01/10/2022 – 30/09/2024) and will produce the following results: integrated tools and methodologies for the Virtual Healthcare Clown work (WP2); a digital platform for the Virtual Healthcare Clown intervention (WP3); a VHC Training Course for Healthcare Clown Operators (WP4).

The goal is to improve the digital contents in the training of HCC professionals, and so to promote innovative, virtual healthcare clown interventions to match the needs of the ongoing Covid-19 emergency and of other logistically disadvantaged areas.

The VHC project foresees the following activities:

• WP1: Project Management and Coordination, Communication, Monitoring and Evaluation.

• WP2: Integrated Contents for VHC Training: a digitally focused syllabus for HCC professionals in compliance with ECVET criteria;

• WP3: VHC Cooperative Platform: a platform for VHC training course and HCC procedures;

• WP4: VHC Training Course for Healthcare Clown Operators: experimentation of the online course through the platform and its validation .

The VHC project foresees the following outcomes and results:

• to develop digital skills for HCC professionals: R1: VHC Training Handbook;

• to learn, develop and transfer the tools and procedures usually used by HCC professionals in a new working digital environment: R2: VHC Cooperative Platform;

to improve their employability with virtual clown-therapy interventions in hospitals and socio-health facilities: R3: VHC Online Training.