DIH-HEROs retrospection on fantastic and successful weeks

DIH-HEROs retrospection on fantastic and successful weeks including multiple activities, brilliant talks and events:

DIH-HERO partners Ana Lucia Cruz Ruiz, Ferdinando Rodriguez y Baena (Imperial) and Selene Tognarelli (SSSA) organised a workshop at the Hamlyn Symposium, to discuss the “Opportunities & challenges of deploying robots in healthcare settings” with James Kinross, Su-Lin Lee, Valentina Vitiello, Vee Mapunde, Gernot Kronreif, Thiusius Rajeeth Savarimuthu at the Royal Geographical Society in London.

Françoise Siepel joined the Funders’ Forum session led by Pietro Valdastri at the Hamlyn Symposium in London, centered around international funding opportunities to engage with funding bodies in the UK and abroad. During the session, the opportunities to fund research in healthcare technologies and avenues to pursue international partnerships and collaborations were discussed.

Parties that have just been awarded a DIH-HERO grant have been invited by the Topic Group Healthcare of euRobotics to pitch their project during the sessions led by Françoise Siepel and Thierry Keller: “Towards transferring robotic technology and innovation to patients” and “Robotic technology leading to better healthcare for all.” 

During the sessions topics such as the DIH-HERO COVID-19 response and deployment, transformation in the healthcare sector and technical competence for healthcare with a focus on AI & cognition, perception and mechatronics were discussed with experts Aleksandra Gruszkiewicz, Martijn Vastenburg, Limor BH Epstein, Dimitris Karageorgos, Luuk Doornebosch, matthieu lemaitre, Nicolas Creff, Valerio Gower, Daniel Serrano, Birgit Graf, Michael Suppa, Sarah Terreri.

Views and experiences from companies regarding best practices in software development and system interoperability included in applying standards have been discussed in the workshop “Industry experiences with healthcare standards” led by Michael Obach. Requirements for developing conformity tools that help in the standards selection of robotics for healthcare were defined and will provide some best practices in software development in this area for the certification process.

During the workshop “DIH-HERO Success Stories of Innovation Coaching and Matchmaking” the innovation coaches Birgitte Østergård Sørensen and Mare Mechelinck and innovators from the field Judith de Koning and Sarah Terreri discussed their experiences regarding the challenges faced, the success stories achieved in innovation and matchmaking and the benefits of the Innovation Coaching during the execution of the Technology Demonstrator and Technology Transfer Experiment projects in a panel discussion moderated by Maren Bödding.

During the LSH010 Breakfast session, Françoise Siepel presented the DIH-HERO network and answered questions from the audience. This session led by Glen Schrijvers was meant to stimulate innovation and collaboration in the life science and health sector.

Furthermore, Iddo Bante and Paola Roberta Boscolo Chio Bisto represented DIH-HERO during several discussions regarding sustainability and resilience of DIH-HERO and the services offered by DIH-HERO over the long-term.