Chicago – Over 2,000 leading executives have committed to attend HIMSS Global Health Conference & Exhibition, now three weeks away and widely considered the global standard of substantive healthcare strategy and innovation. Refreshed programs and content are expected to bring even more industry leaders to the summit slated for April 17-21 in Chicago.

A new microfluidic device developed by scientists in Switzerland can detect the SARS-CoV-2 virus with high accuracy and speed, using a unique DNA/RNA duplex technology. The device can prove to be a game-changer in the fight against the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

Vitestro, a Dutch medical robotics company, today unveiled the world's most advanced autonomous blood drawing device at the annual meeting of the Netherlands Society for Clinical Chemistry and Laboratory Medicine (NVKC) in Rotterdam. Vitestro's device combines AI-based, ultrasound-guided 3D reconstruction with robotic needle insertion, ensuring accurate and secure blood collection. The venipuncture technology is adaptable to patients of 16 years of age onwards, comorbidities, and puncture difficulty. From 2023, Vitestro will initiate pivotal clinical studies for regulatory approval in Europe. EU-market introduction is anticipated in 2024.

Longensis, a startup based in Latvia and Hong Hong, has taken home the main prize at TechChill – 10,000 EUR, no strings attached. Gelatex and VREACH divide 250,000 EUR in angel investment from the pan-Baltic syndicate. The leading Baltic tech and startup event brought together over 1,700 attendees from over 600 different organizations from 29 countries, with 178 speakers taking the virtual stage.

Longenesis is a B2B startup offering a platform to biomedical organizations to reduce the length of clinical trials. This is done through enabling direct communication for safe data curation and compliant, consent-enabled biomedical data utilization for research. 

On 18 February, a two-week official validation test started of revolutionary new COVID-19 rapid testing method: a breath test with the QuBA (Quick Breath Analyzer). Fast, safe, reliable and - very important - without any nasty swabs in your nose and throat.

The test could be a huge breakthrough in getting social life back on track.

Users take the test by entering the testing cabin and speaking out loud.

15 surgeons from 13 different countries have undertaken 13 mixed reality orthopedic operations as part of a 24-hour event. The surgeons virtually collaborated using Microsoft HoloLens 2 and Dynamics 365 Remote Assist, and were led by Professor Thomas Grégory of the Avicenne AP-HP Hospital, France.

Medicine’s (virtual) world tour

Professor Grégory and his team led all 13 mixed reality surgeries from the Avicenne AP-HP Hospital. From there, the surgery toured a number of countries, including: France, India, UAE, South Africa, Ukraine, Germany, Belgium, Morocco, Brazil, Bolivia, Mexico, USA, UK.

As part of Singapore’s efforts to enhance its nation-wide COVID-19 testing capabilities, ABB’s high-precision robots have been deployed in a new automated laboratory system, known as the Rapid Automated Volume Enhancer (RAVE).

The system automates some of the manual steps usually required in sample processing. Two sets of RAVE and associated equipment can process an industry-topping throughput of close to 4,000 samples a day. RAVE also reduces test contamination and infection risks for laboratory workers.

Using approximately 2.6 million microscopy images of canine kidney cells, members of an international research group, containing contributors from Estonia and Russia have built and trained a deep learning model to better understand how cells grow and divide. This research opens a novel way to identify more quickly and more easily the cell cycle ‘clock’ for every cell that is essential to understand diseases like cancer. The methods and results of their work have now been published in the journal Molecular Systems Biology.

 ^{Photo: (CC) Darko Stojanovic / Pixabay}

The recent EIT Health and McKinsey & Company’s report “Transforming healthcare with AI: The impact on the workforce and organisations” has exposed an urgent need to attract, educate and train a generation of data literate healthcare professionals, whilst up-skilling the current workforce if we are to fully realise the transformative potential of Artificial Intelligence (AI).

89 startups from across Europe of which 14 are based in Scandinavia are selected for support to accelerate the development of promising health solutions.

Headstart is set up to help startups getting closer to market, receive clinical verification, evaluate patient need and benefit of their product or service as well as attracting further private investment. Through EIT Health’s network, the companies will make valuable contacts within EIT Health’s innovation ecosystem and will receive financial support of up to €50 000 each.