l’Agence nationale Luxembourgeoise des informations partagées dans le domaine de la santé recherche un Directeur Général afin de développer, organiser et rendre opérationnelle cette nouvelle structure. Sa mission est de créer des services innovants fondés sur les technologies de l’information pour l’échange et le partage des informations de santé, ceci, dans le respect de strictes exigences en matière de protection de données. Le détail de l'offre est sur le site du recruteur, la date limite pour soumettre votre candidature est le 27 janvier 2012.

The 'ALIAS' EU-funded project involves eight hospitals from five countries in the Alpine region, with the aim of fostering the development of cities and regions through European co-operation. In the context of the collaboration, access to telemedicine services is to be improved by linking together a number of Alpine Space hospitals enabling the creation of a network shaping the ALIAS Virtual Hospital for sharing medical information, adopting telemedicine service and exchanging best clinical practices, to improve the efficiency of hospitals for the benefit of patients and healthcare professionals.

Scientists and surgeons from France, Germany, the United Kingdom and Switzerland have developed a "virtual liver", using EU research funding, which will help surgeons better plan and carry out tumour operations and ensure quicker patient recovery. The PASSPORT project (Patient-Specific Simulation and Pre-Operative Realistic Training) makes a uniquely accurate "virtual liver" available to physicians based on medical images sent by the radiologist to a PASSPORT online service, which helps surgeons decide whether they should or not operate. Surgeons can now see more precisely where a tumour is and where they will have to operate to safely remove it.

The draft ICT PSP Work Programme 2012 has been approved by the CIP ICT Committee. The work programme is still subject to the formal approval by the Commission (expected in January 2012). The 6th Call for Proposals would be opened from 1 February to 15 May 2012 (pending formal approval of the Work programme 2012 by the Commission). Please pencil in the date of 3 February 2012 for an information day on the 6th Call for Proposals in Brussels. Confirmation of the date, the exact venue and the draft agenda (the event is planned from 9h30 to 16h00) will be published during the week of 9 January 2012. On line registration will be open from that page during the same week.

President Ilves (chairing the European e-health work group) implored the developers of the report to focus also on those interest groups that resist the disclosure of statistical information on treatment, to a certain extent for legitimate reasons, but also the so-called professional code of honour, as such information would allow future patients to take well-informed decisions and chose between different methods of treatment, doctors and hospitals.

Brussels, 20 December 2011: Each year, the public authorities spend 18% of GDP on goods, services and works. Given the current budgetary restrictions and economic difficulties in most Member States, public procurement policy must, more than ever, ensure the optimal use of funds in order foster growth and job creation and thereby help to achieve the objectives of the Europe 2020 Strategy. The revision of the public procurement Directives announced by the Commission today is part of an overall programme to thoroughly modernise public tendering in the European Union. This programme also includes a Directive on concessions, which until now have been only partially regulated at European level and present specific features which justify a separate text, while maintaining consistency with the general reform.

Providing citizens with 'services of general economic interest', such as healthcare or waste management, is one of the core tasks of regional and local authorities across Europe. In doing so, they have to comply with EU laws aimed at ensuring fair competition in the market. These rules are very complex and also cover many small-scale local services with no commercial dimension or no relevance for cross-border trade.

A study led by Research Professor Matej Orešič from VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland (participating in EU funded PredictAD project) suggests that Alzheimer’s disease is preceded by a molecular signature indicative of hypoxia and up-regulated pentose phosphate pathway. This indicator can be analysed as a simple biochemical assay from a serum sample months or even years before the first symptoms of the disease occur. In a healthcare setting, application of such an assay could therefore complement the neurocognitive assessment by the medical doctor and could be applied to identify the at-risk patients in need of further comprehensive follow-up.

European funded project PredictAD has developed a decision support tool for objective diagnostics of Alzheimer’s disease. The tool compares measurements of a patient to measurements of other persons available in large databases and provides a simple index about the severity of the disease. The project has shown that the tool improves the accuracy of diagnosis and clinicians’ confidence about their decision, making earlier diagnosis possible.

COMMODITY12 is a unique system for the analysis of multi-parametric medical data in patients suffering from diabetes. The consortium involves research institutes, university experts and industrial companies. Together they cover a broad field of expertise ranging from genomics, and medical knowledge to medical devices and e-health. COMMODITY12 will uptake the existing cutting-edge technologies and extend these technologies by combining state-of-the-art networks, software interoperation, and artificial intelligence techniques in order to realize the concept of translational medicine by means of a Personal Health System. Moreover, it will build a new level in patient empowerment, providing the tools for self-management support. Indirectly, this system will also help wider implementation of Personal Health Systems, reinforcing leadership and innovation capability of the European industry in that area.

A final report on the public consultation on the eHealth Action Plan 2012-2020 has been published. The consultation, which involved a range of stakeholders including NGOs, academic institutions, enterprises, health and social care providers and public authorities from many Member States, aimed to validate four proposed objectives and to explore possible actions to be undertaken in the coming years. More than 90% of the stakeholders agreed with the four main objectives of the eHealth Action Plan and concluded that the main benefit of eHealth solution is to improve the quality, the efficiency and the sustainability of the available healthcare services.

During the Innovation Convention, the winners of the EU Prize for Women Innovators, Gitte Neubauer, Fabienne Hermitte and Ilaria Rosso, were awarded - see the winners's related videos. The European Commission has launched this contest to reward women innovators who have achieved outstanding innovations and brought them to market. The prize aims to inspire and raise awareness of the need for more women innovators and entrepreneurs. The contest was open to all women who have at some stage participated in the EU Framework Programmes.

p-medicine project, launched in February this year, is a 4-year Integrated project aiming at developing a new and state-of-the-art IT platform for personalized medicine. The researchers elaborated the first deliverables according to the agreed 'Description of Work', they identified and described motivated use case scenarios by underlining the p-medicine platform's end user needs and requirements.

The European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) is to significantly step up its efforts to drive innovation and entrepreneurship in the EU with the creation of six new cross-border innovation hubs, known as Knowledge and Innovation Communities (KICs), in 2014-2020. The European Commission has allocated a budget of €2.8 billion in the next financial framework to enable the EIT to expand and consolidate the development of its existing KICs which focus on climate change, sustainable energy and ICT.

Several projects just started in this end of year. They will address Personal Health Systems (PHS): ARMOR, CareToy, CogWatch, Commodity12, CONTRAST, CuPiD, D-LIVER, Dem@Care, INTERACTION, MICHELANGELO, MovingLife, REMPARK, REWIRE, SCRIPT, SENSE-PARK, StrokeBack; Patient Guidance Services (PGS), safety and healthcare record information reuse: eHealthMonitor, Linked2Safety, MobiGuide, SemanticHealthNet, TRANSFoRm-EnlargedEU; and Virtual Physiological Human: DISCIPULUS. More information will be available soon.

The EU funded project PSIP has developed innovative computer-based applications able to automatically detect situations at risk and to deliver healthcare professionals and patients’ relevant “ad hoc” information helping them to prevent Adverse Drug Events. It has developed tools to search hospital databases and provide reliable numbers about Adverse Drug Events per country, hospital or medical unit, describing their type, consequences and probable causes. To date the prototypes are used routinely in different hospitals. The continuous evaluation of their impact on ADE rates is ongoing and has already provided promising and positive preliminary results.

EU-funded researchers from Germany, Italy, Israel and the UK have achieved a breakthrough development in robotic neurosurgery. The ROBOCAST project has developed a new type of robot that gives two important advantages to surgeons: 13 degrees (types) of movement, compared to the four available to human hands during minimally invasive surgery, and "haptic feedback" the physical cues which allow surgeons to assess tissue and perceive the amount of force applied during surgery. The robot has performed accurate keyhole neurosurgery on dummies, and when ready for humans, could ease the suffering of millions of Europeans diagnosed with tumours, and conditions such as epilepsy, Parkinson's disease and Tourette syndrome.

The eHealth Week event, now hailed as the largest annual pan-European eHealth conference, not only brings industry partners and providers from across Europe, but also important government and regional decision makers. Join, Exhibit and reach these audiences from across Europe.

The objective of the Competition is to support business success of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) by giving them visibility, together with marketing opportunities to attract customers, partners and external capital. In order to participate, SMEs have to register by filling a simple form. Eligible SMEs will receive in January a template, and the received information will be evaluated to select the 30 SMEs that will enter into the European Final. The Final will be celebrated during the eHealth Week 2012 in Copenhagen (Denmark) on 7 May 2012. Please note that Associations (clusters, technological parks, etc) can also collaborate with the Competition management, and receive benefits for their work. Registration closes on 30/12.

Le centre hospitalier de Haguenau, en partenariat avec le groupement de coopération sanitaire e-santé Alsace, présentera prochainement le DMP, dossier médical personnel. La version nationale du DMP, dossier médical personnel, a été inaugurée au début de l'année dans la région. L'Alsace a fait partie des quatre régions ayant expérimenté cet accès électronique aux données de santé.