Innovative healthcare IT and medical technology solutions are one step closer to winning the coveted IT @ 2012 trophy and cash prize at the IT @ Networking Awards 2012.
Willy Heuschen, Secretary General of the European Association of Hospital Managers officially opened the event, welcoming contestants and delegates. Heuschen highlighted the increasing importance and relevance of healthcare IT and the great opportunity the IT @ Networking Awards is for decision-makers to learn about these solutions; to have access to their developers and users; and to ask questions and judge the projects themselves.
Christian Marolt, Secretary-General of the European Association of Healthcare IT Managers (HITM) also addressed the crowd. His message was clear: this is not a normal congress but a competition and an exciting opportunity to showcase the latest innovations in healthcare IT and medical technology. He stressed that today was just a taster of what is to come tomorrow with the in-depth WorkBench presentations.
President of HITM, Josep M. Picas gave the keynote speech stressing the changing nature of healthcare and healthcare IT. He concluded that European countries can learn from each other’s experiences and bring this information back to their own hospitals and that innovation should be promoted from the bottom up, i.e from clinicians.
The top 15 nominees presented their projects at IT @ Networking Awards 2012 January 18 at the General Secretariat of the European Association of Hospital Managers, Clinique St. Jean, Brussels, Belgium.
During the MindByte sessions, presenters from Italy, Spain, the Netherlands and even as far afield as South Africa joined together to share their experiences of implementing innovative healthcare IT and medical technology solutions. Projects ranged from EMRs and primary healthcare information systems to genome sequencing and schizophrenia prediction. The audience and panel of expert judges did not hold back in questioning each presenter before casting their votes.
The top eight finalists selected from the MindByte sessions are:
-3D PACS Through Virtual Reality (Sisopacs)- SISOFT (Nejat Unsal)
-Bedside Detection of Awareness in the Vegetative State (Camille Chatelle)
-Polytechnic University Hospital “La Fe” in Valencia, Spain- Mobility System to Guarantee Clinical Safety and Optimize Bedside Processes, Saving Costs (Serafin Arroyo)
-EyeSmart EMR- Intelligent IT Solution for Eyecare (Anthony Vipin Das)
-MyHCL Project (Lyons public hospitals, France) (Cecile Dolla)
-Individualised Patient Disease Diagnosis and Treatment through Whole Genome Sequencing and Comparison (Peter van de Spek)
-Successful Development and Implementation of a Primary Healthcare Information System (Ian de Vega)
-A New System for Continual Defensive Monitoring and Rapid Response: Saving Lives and Reducing Costs by Extending Best-Practices in Surgery and Critical Care Across the Enterprise (Jeffrey Charles Bauer)
Finalists will move onto the WORKBENCH sessions on January 19, where they will have the opportunity to demonstrate and discuss their solutions in greater detail and to participate in a Q&A from the audience. The top three solutions will be awarded their prizes during the evening reception at the Belle Etage, 69 rue d’Alexiens, Brussels.
