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Photo of the audience at the opening of EHiN 2019.

EHiN 2019 – highlights

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Did you miss EHiN this year? Or simply want to catch up on the highlights relating to cancer research? Read our short summary below.

EHiN, short for e-health in Norway, is Norway’s national conference on e-health. It is a meeting place where decision-makers, the business community and the health sector gather to talk, share knowledge, learn from each other and collaborate.

This year, Oslo Cancer Cluster became a co-owner of EHiN (together with ICT Norway and Macsimum), because we believe new technologies and digital solutions are essential in the development of novel cancer treatments. This will only be possible if public and private organizations find new models of collaboration and EHiN is a great platform to create those future partnerships.

Read this interview to find out more about how new technologies can improve cancer research

 

Photo from the panel discussion on health data at EHiN 2019.

A conversation on health data during day 1 of EHiN 2019. Photo credit: Ard Jongsma / Still Water Photography

Capturing the value of health data

An engaging dialogue on the value of health data took place at the end of the first day.

Health data will revolutionize how we understand and how we treat diseases, such as cancer. Better diagnosis and monitoring will change how we design our healthcare systems. A central question is how we capture the value of this revolution. Some fear multinationals like Google and Facebook will exploit our unique health data for profit. Others fear that Norwegians will value and protect their health data too well, resulting in innovation happening elsewhere. Is there a golden mean between giving full access to health data and charging the highest price?

Ketil Widerberg, General Manager at Oslo Cancer Cluster, led the conversation with a panel of four. Joanne Hackett, Chief Commercial Officer at Genomics England, brought an international perspective and experiences of how they have collected 100 000 genomes from patients with rare diseases. Sigrid Bratlie, award-winning cancer researcher, shared her knowledge of new cancer treatments and the opportunities they present in conjunction with health data. Heidi Beate Bentzen, Doctoral Research Fellow at University of Oslo, represented some of the legal considerations when dealing with health data. Rajji Mehdwan, General Manager at Roche, contributed with the pharma industry perspective.

 

Photo of the expo area during EHiN 2019.

The crowded crowded expo area during EHiN 2019. Photo credit: Ard Jongsma / Still Water Photography

Networking in the expo area

The expo area is the heart and soul of EHiN. This is where public and private organizations can meet under informal circumstances and create new partnerships. These collaborations are what lead to knowledge sharing and that digital solutions can be implemented in the health sector.

This year, a pharma company was present in the expo area for the very first time, our member Roche. Roche are investing more in genetic testing and personalized medicines than ever before. But why are genetic tests important for cancer treatments? Cancer is more than a disease, it is about the composition of DNA, RNA and proteins – and how these relate to one another. Every cancer tumor is therefore unique, but by finding out more about the genetic sequence, one can develop personalized treatments that target the tumor effectively.

In the expo area, a variety of start-ups, IT companies, health clusters, public organisations and academic institutions were also present. For two days, the area was buzzing with interactions, meetings and talks.

We hope you carry on the conversations and that we see all of you again next year!

The e-health meeting place

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Oslo Cancer Cluster will co-power the conference E-health in Norway (EHiN).

– This is a natural continuation of the work we do in digitalisation, for a better understanding of cancer and better patient treatment, said Ketil Widerberg, General Manager of Oslo Cancer Cluster, at EHiN 2018.

The Norwegian Ministry of Health and Care Services (HOD) and ICT Norway started a collaboration on creating a national meeting place for e-health. ICT Norway launched the first EHiN conference five years ago. Oslo Cancer Cluster is happy to announce that we are now one of the three stakeholders in this yearly conference, together with ICT Norway and Macsimum.

EHiN attracts a large audience from Norwegian government and business. The speaker in this picture is Christine Bergland, Director at the Norwegian Directorate of eHealth (NDE).

EHiN attracts a large audience from Norwegian government and business. The speaker in this picture is Christine Bergland, Director at the Norwegian Directorate of eHealth (NDE).

Norwegian e-health  
EHiN 2018 took place in Oslo Spektrum and was the biggest meeting place for actors in the public and private sector working with e-health in Norway. The conference had 150 speakers and 1300 participants. EHiN 2019 will be the 6th year of the conference.

What happened at EHiN 2018?

 — EHiN is an important meeting place for public and private actors, and for academia and business. This is a natural prolongation of the many meeting places Oslo Cancer Cluster is always working to establish and preserve, Ketil Widerberg says.

Digital technologies are part of what drives innovation to the maximum benefit of cancer patients. Widerberg is certain that e-health will change the way we understand and treat cancer in the future.

– E-health is part of the matrix for how we give the right medicine to the right patient at the right time, meaning precision medicine. One example of what we specifically do in this area, is a recent project we have been part of, called PERMIDES.

An e-health success story
From August 2016 until August 2018, Oslo Cancer Cluster together with five other European clusters in medicine and ICT, was managing a Horizon 2020 EU project called PERMIDES. It is a European e-health success story in bringing together biopharma and IT sectors.

D.B.R.K Gupta Udatha at the EHiN conference in 2018. Dr. Udatha was the project manager for PERMIDES at Oslo Cancer Cluster.

D.B.R.K Gupta Udatha at the EHiN conference in 2018. Dr. Udatha was the project manager for PERMIDES at Oslo Cancer Cluster.

D.B.R.K Gupta Udatha is Director (Digital and EU) at Oslo Cancer Cluster. He has been instrumental in PERMIDES and explains why the project has had such a positive effect on the small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) it has worked with. 

— PERMIDES was a project to anchorage digital transformation across SMEs in biotechnology and pharmaceuticals. We aimed to see where the biopharma companies were lacking digital infrastructure and where the ICT companies could bring digital skills to make sure that the biopharma companies were up to date, Dr. Udatha said at EHiN 2018.

The project created matchmaking opportunities between these two different categories of companies and was awarded EUR 4.8 million from the EU’s Horizon2020 programme. It addressed specific challenges for SMEs to go digital with a precision medicine product.