New trends in the health sector, medtech industry and medical robotics, just some of the topics of latest edition of MOEBIO Short Programs

This January saw the kick off of the second edition of the MOEBIO Short Programs, five training programs created by Biocat based on the Design Health Barcelona (d·HEALTH Barcelona) program and geared towards students, professionals and entrepreneurs to give them practical knowledge on key aspects of healthcare, innovation, management and business spirit. Each program lasts no more than 20 hours, divided into 3 to 8 sessions of varying lengths. Those interested may attend individual sessions without doing the whole program.

New this year, some of the MOEBIO Short Programs are available at a 30% discount for hospital professionals and a 50% discount for students in their 4^th year at university or doing masters degrees in economics, the health and life sciences, engineering or design.

Two of the five programs kicked off on 18 and 19 January: Understanding Healthcare Systems and Update on the Life Sciences Industry. The Medical Devices I: Product Development program will begin in February and the other two programs, Medical Devices II: Market Access and Entrepreneurship and Management, in May.

New trends in the life sciences

As part of the program Update on the Life Sciences Industry, Montserrat Vendrell, director general of the Barcelona Institute of Science and Technology, will give a session on 21 January on the future of the life sciences and the trends that will impact the coming years. Focusing on topics like telemedicine, personalized medicine and synthetic biology or brain stimulation through interface technology.

Medtech industry

In the previous packet of sessions, Robert Harju-Jeanty, founder of Medical Lead and mentor for the Clinical Innovation Fellowships Program (CIF) at the Center for Technology in Medicine and Health (CTMH) will give a session on 2 February on the medtech industry. This session will explain what a medical device is and provide key statistics on the main stakeholders in the sector: number and type of companies, R&D investment, employment, medical technology spending, number of patents submitted, venture capital options, etc. The session will also cover trends in this sector by size and growth from the number of medical technologies registered and the value chain (based on Michael Porter’s methodology).

Challenges of medical robotics

The third packet of sessions entitled Medical Devices I: Product Development will begin on 5 February and run through the month of July, with one session per month. Josep Amat, professor at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia and world-renowned expert in the field of applied robotics, will give a session on the challenges of medical robotics, explaining what robotics is and which different types of medical robotics systems are currently available. He will also discuss current trends in this field, especially surgical robotics and artificial intelligence, and which companies are currently working in these areas.

MOEBIO Short Programs 2016: