Tag Archives: investment

Antisuperbugs: 3 million euros for technological innovation in the prevention of resistance of microorganisms to antibiotics

31 May

The healthcare market is one of the areas with the greatest purchasing impact in the public and private sector in Spain with a business turnover of 71 billion euros annually. It is a very complex market where the formulas used for purchasing both consumer goods and drugs, and services depend on the centres themselves. However, they also depend on the local regulations of suppliers, autonomous regions as well as state and community legislation.

This complexity does not only make it impossible for companies to make their products or services available to procurers but it is also often the interested parties in the purchasing that see the inclusion of these produces in their centre and their accessibility to their staff as a truly impossible mission.

And this is a whole lot more difficult when it comes to incorporating new technologies that meet the real needs of professionals.

In a panorama where investment in research and development is at its lowest point in recent decades, having a pre-commercial public procurement project subsidised by the European Union with 3 million euros is a big opportunity for companies that can offer their R+D services to create innovation which responds to the real needs of professionals.

An innovative public procurement project is an approach to innovation based on demand, where a group of procurers combine their resources to share risk in a joint R+D effort in the industry to provide solutions to needs which are not being met by the market. In the case of our project, it would be an ICT solution aimed at the early detection of microorganisms resistant to antibiotics (superbugs) in a healthcare environment, the Antisuperbugs project, coordinated by Jean Patrick Mathieu of the Agency for Health Quality and Assessment of Catalonia (AQuAS).

Antisuperbugs team (from left to right): Kristina Fogel, Sara Bedin, Maren Geissler, Dag Ilver, Benian Ghebremedhin, Jean Patrick Mathieu, Enric Limon, Gonçalo de Carvalho, Gemma Cabré, Esther Arévalo

The consortium coordinated by the AQuAS, an expert institution in the definition and execution of public procurement projects in innovation in Spain, consists of 6 contracting authorities (the Catalan Institute of Oncology – IDIBELL (ES), Hospital Mútua of Terrassa (ES), Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (UK), Helios Kliniken (DE), Universitaetsklinikum Aachen (DE) and Autonomous Province of Trento (IT)), and two expert institutions in their area of research at RISE ACREO (SE) and Sara Bedin (IT).

Enric Limon of the VINCat Programme (Surveillance of Infections) of the CatSalut, principal researcher of the project, sees having a detector of microorganisms resistant to antibiotics as a business opportunity for a company.  In the United States, Asian and European Union markets, solutions are being sought that will make it possible to have a rapid detection system that activates early detection mechanisms. The resistance of certain microorganisms to antibiotics is creating a situation of alarm across the world to which the World Health Organisation (WHO) itself has drawn attention, estimating a figure of 50 million deaths in the years to come if adequate measures are not taken. The successful tendering companies will not only have access to funding but also receive the support of hundreds of professionals from six European institutions at the highest level in research and a potential market in a first phase of hundreds of hospitals and healthcare centres interested in purchasing a solution that they themselves have helped create.

Gonçalo de Carvalho, expert biologist in resistances at the Catalan Institute of Oncology, explains the need for this project to consider the possibility of creating new modules that when applied to the technologies themselves enable new detections to be made which makes purchasing them even more attractive to health institutions by adapting them to their own needs.

The tender which will be opened to companies in the next few months forms part of the Pre-Commercial Public Procurement programmes funded within the European Commission’s H2020 framework of reference. All the information regarding the Antisuperbugs project and the tendering options are available on the website of the project.

Interested companies can access the questionnaire of the open call of the market.

There is also the option for companies to offer their availability by putting in a tender as a consortium.

Post written by Jean Patrick Mathieu, Enric Limon and Gonçalo de Carvalho.

The speed and relevance of assessing health products

5 Oct
Emmanuel Giménez

The European market of health products has been widely affected by the sudden emergence of a new legislative framework with the new regulations (2017/745 and 2017/746). The subtle difference between directive and regulation is paramount, they say, but we’ll leave that for another occasion. This new framework in the field of health products is characterised among other things by:

  1. A stricter control of high risk health products (for example, certain implantable products)
  2. The strengthening of rules of clinical evidence by including a coordinated procedure at a European level for the authorisation of multicentre clinical research.
  3. The reinforcement of requirements and the coordination between European countries regarding controls and after sales aspects.

In this context of important changes, the assessment community is also clearly active. Thus, on 19 June this year, there was a panel on health products at the international meeting of Health Technology Assessment HTAi, where a new and innovative Italian programme for health products was presented.

The programme, explaining the work carried out over several years in terms of definition and its pilot phase, includes three work packages: appraisal, methodology and monitoring. In another panel closely related to the previous one, in the field of methodology, the presentation of the categories to decide on what to invest in and what to disinvest win clearly stood out.

When talking about monitoring and collecting information, an example that stood out was the debate on the need for early assessments given that the life cycle of a health product tends to be short.

The significant increase in new products available and all the work objects previously mentioned are some of the things that position the importance of specific assessment in health products.

The importance of the assessment of health products is, therefore, undeniable. In the joint production work package of EUnetHTA JA3, in which AQuAS is participating, as many or more assessments of “other technologies” (health products, health interventions,…) have been planned as of the known assessments of drugs. In a sense, the numbers of one or other necessity are matched. The importance of the assessment of “other technologies” was in fact reflected in the HTAi annual meeting in a presentation by Wim Goettsch, director of EUnetHA.

The identification and prioritisation of products to be assessed (the Horizon Scanning system), as well as the balance between innovation and divestment, are also extensively discussed subjects and under continuous debate. Thus, in the REDETS network (in which the AQuAS is also actively participating) and with the leadership of Avalia-T, a public access tool was identified that helps in approaching this subject: the PriTec.

Assessment, therefore, can help directly in the use, management and sustainability of different health systems. In conclusion, new opportunities are provided for improving decision making in the area of health products and some of them will come through demonstrating efficiency by means of the adequate use and definition of health technology assessments (HTA).

Post written by Emmanuel Giménez.