IN-4-AHA Final Conference
IN-4-AHA comes to an end after working the past two years to support digital innovation for Active and Healthy Ageing in Europe. We have come across several opportunities and challenges related to the current policy landscape and the environment in which European AHA stakeholders operate and cannot wait to share our insights with you during IN-4-AHA’s final conference on 7 December, in Estonia (onsite) and online!
Taking place at Arvo Pärt Centre in Laulasmaa, Estonia, the conference will be opened by a welcome message from Dubravka Šuica, Vice President for Democracy and Demography, European Commission, and a keynote from the Estonian Vice-chancellor for Innovation, Nele Labi.
Following the opening and an overview of the IN-4-AHA project from Piret Hirv, IN-4-AHA project lead, the final conference will then take you through our work of the past 2 years in three sessions featuring both project partners and external high-level speakers. The sessions will focus on discussing key challenges addressed, solutions offered by the IN-4-AHA consortium, and related recommendations. The event will end with a panel debate on the present and future of active and healthy ageing in Europe, followed by a networking reception.
Throughout the day, participants will be also able to discover more details about the work of IN-4-AHA thanks to a mini-exhibition featuring a set of posters summarizing the main activities and products of the consortium.
PLEASE NOTE – for those following the Conference online, the actual programme will start at 11.00 EET/ 10.00 CET!
FOLLOW THE LIVE STREAMING ABOVE or on our Facebook event page
Agenda
Dubravka Šuica, Vice President for Democracy and Demography, European Commission (video message)
Piret Hirv, IN-4-AHA project leader, Tehnopol/Estonian Connected Health Cluster, Estonia
Nele Labi, Vice-chancellor for Innovation, Estonian Ministry of Social Affairs, Estonia
Moderation – T. Zajc, conference moderator
Introduction to the topic – Andreas Palm, Senior Consultant, CIVITTA (WP6)
Panel:
Piret Hirv, IN-4-AHA project leader, Tehnopol/Estonian Connected Health Cluster Tehnopol (WP3)
Andreas Palm, Senior Consultant, CIVITTA (WP6)
External Speakers
Annika Szabo Portela, Managing Director, EIT Health Scandinavia
Moderation – T. Zajc, conference moderator
Introduction to the topic – Gisela Garcia Alvarez, Managing Director, Cluster Saude de Galicia (WP4)
Panel:
Anni Kurmiste, Health Policy Analyst, Praxis (WP5)
Gisela Garcia Alvarez, Managing Director, Cluster Saude de Galicia (WP4)
External Speakers
Nick Guldemond, Professor healthcare and public health at Sechenov Medical University and Leiden University Medical Center in the Netherlands, Expert Member WHO Working Group Digital Health
Victor Stephani, Chief of Staff, HelloBetter
Moderation – T. Zajc, conference moderator
Introduction to the topic – Hille Hinsberg, Product Manager, Proud Engineers (WP5)
Panel:
Hille Hinsberg, Product Manager, Proud Engineers (WP5)
Liina Joller-Vahter, IN-4-AHA Project Manager, EIT Health Scandinavia (WP2)
External Speakers
Jukka Lähesmaa, Consulting Officer, Ministry of Social Affairs and Health, Finland
Karolina Mackiewicz, Innovation Director, ECHAlliance
Moderation – T. Zajc, conference moderator
Intro to the topic – Michele Calabro, EUREGHA
Panel:
Donna Henderson, Head of International Engagement, Digital Health and Care Directorate, Scottish Government
Nele Labi, Vice-chancellor for Innovation, Estonian Ministry of Social Affairs, Estonia
Michele Calabro, Director, EUREGHA – European Regional and Local Health Authorities
Mihkel Tedremaa, co-founder, TempID (SME)
Irina Kalderon Libal, Policy Officer, Unit “eHealth, Wellbeing and Ageing “ DG CONNECT, European Commission (online)
Piret Hirv, IN-4-AHA project leader, Tehnopol/Estonian Connected Health Cluster, Estonia
Confirmed speakers:
Tjaša Zajc
Tjaša Zajc is an internationally recognized digital health moderator and speaker focused on global healthcare digitalization. Brainlab put her on the list of 9 Digital Health Experts to Follow on LinkedIn in 2021, Health Tech listed her among 30 Healthcare IT Influencers Worth a Follow in 2021. She is the founder and host of Faces of digital health podcast, which is consistently ranked among the top digital health industry podcasts, she works as a business developer at the healthcare IT company Better, and is a patient advocate.
Nele Labi
In the Estonian Ministry of Social Affairs, my role is to bring the health, social and labor sectors closer together. The best way to do this is to look at services from our client’s perspective and thereby eliminate barriers and create new values. All my previous examples of cooperation with partners from other sectors or other countries say that we always have one common goal - the will to offer the best to people. By keeping this commonality in mind, it is possible to find synergy in every collaboration.
Hille Hinsberg
Hille is an expert in open government and digital services, currently working with a team of consultants on digital transformation, Proud Engineers. She coaches teams in government agencies in designing person-centered services and managing data in their work flows. Her previous assignments include advising a policy for Social Innovation for Estonian Government Office. Hille has served at International Expert Panel of the Independent Review Mechanism, the research arm of the Open Government Partnership (OGP). She worked as a policy analyst at the Open Government unit in the OECD. She is founding member of Open Knowledge Estonia and active in Estonian Open Data movement
Anni Kurmiste
Anni is a health policy analyst in Praxis Think Tank, working with multiple health and care related topics such as health behavior of different groups of people and social care system services and the workforce. She is the manager for multiple projects, as well as working as an analyst and conducting research. She holds a degree in Public Administration and Political Science from Tallinn University of Technology and is studying for a Master's degree from the University of Tartu in Public Health.
Michele Calabro'
Michele Calabro’ is Director at EUREGHA, the European reference network for Regional and Local Health Authorities. As EUREGHA Director, he leads the work of the association’s secretariat, covering projects advocacy, knowledge exchange and partnerships. Prior to joining EUREGHA in May 2022, Michele worked at the European Health Management Association as Policy and Communications Manager, at the European Patients’ Forum as Policy Adviser, and at DIGITALEUROPE as Senior Manager for Digital Health Policy.
Mihkel Tedremaa
Mihkel is a co-founder of medtech company called TempID that provides reliable and reusable continuous body temperature monitoring solution for both home and professional care. Mihkel has a background in engineering, product and software development industries and has been helping other startups to launch their solutions to the market.
Annika Szabo Portela
Annika Szabo Portela is Managing Director for EIT Health Scandinavia part of EIT (European Institute of Innovation and Technology) one of the world’s largest life science networks. Working across borders, EIT Health bring together the brightest minds from the worlds of business, research, education, and healthcare delivery to answer the biggest health challenges Europe faces. Annika works strategically with innovation and partnership at the intersection of academia, business, and the public sector. The mission includes making EIT Health Scandinavia a springboard to Europe for Nordic innovative healthcare companies. Prior to joining EIT health she studied and worked in Sweden, the UK and France (Karolinska Institutet, Karolinska University Hospital, KTH Royal Institute of Technology, City University London, INSEAD Business School). Annika has a PhD in Medical Science and a clinical background in Speech Language Pathology. Her clinical background and experience from research and higher education from Sweden and abroad has proven an excellent resource for exploring and facilitating new ideas and find practical resources creating products and services rooted in innovation.
Piret Hirv
Piret Hirv is the Manager of Connected Health Cluster and the leader of the health-tech division in Science and Business Park Tehnopol. She is an active and valued member in various international health technology networks, facilitating the development of healthcare services through the implementation of connected health solutions, supporting companies in finding suitable development partners, and also helping to find partners to scale-up innovative solutions (also cross border). Prior to working at Tehnopol, Piret worked as an Advisor for E-Servies and Innovation at the Ministry of Social Affairs in Estonia, supporting the digital transformation processes in healthcare and innovation. Piret has a medical background: she is a trained nurse and has worked in the pharmaceutical industry.
Liina Joller-Vahter
Liina is a guest researcher at the University of Tartu and also contributing to EIT Health Scandinavia’s team with her expertise on accelerating innovation in the healthcare sector. At her alma mater she is teaching the executives a course on innovation management and the STEM students on biotechnology entrepreneurship. Besides, she is coaching both start-ups and incumbent companies on innovation management and contributes to innovation policy development.
Andreas Palm
I am a senior consultant in the Estonian office of CIVITTA where I am mainly focusing on advising private sector clients on strategy, market trends, financials and acquisitions. My project portfolio over the three years I have been in CIVITTA includes IP-for-equity investment strategy creation for the University of Tartu and Tehnopol, many buy-side transaction advisory projects, start-up funding advisory projects, market research and expansion projects. I hold both a bachelor’s and master’s degree from Sciences Po Paris where my focus areas were economics, business and finance.
Donna Henderson
In her role as Head of International Engagement, Donna leads the Scottish Government’s Digital Health and Care Directorate’s International Engagement Team. The Team’s objectives are to enhance Scotland's reputation as a leader in digital health and care, facilitate knowledge exchange between other countries and regions and promote economic opportunities for Scotland. Donna has co-ordinated Scottish involvement in European funded digital health research and innovation projects since 2012. She also acted as Chair of the European Innovation Partnership on Active and Healthy Ageing Action Group on Integrated Care from 2015 to 2018. In January 2021, she was appointed as President of the European Health Telematics Association (EHTEL). She was also proud to be recognised by HIMSS as a Future50 Class of 2021 Government Leader.
Gisela Garcia-Alvarez
Gisela Garcia-Alvarez, Managing Director of the Galician Health Cluster (CSG) since end of 2016, is Doctor in Biochemistry with more than 15 years of experience in health systems in Europe and Asia. She led the first health and life sciences cluster in Singapore in 2010, combining it with her research and teaching activities at Duke-NUS. Eager to "make things work" she shifted towards management of innovation and moved to Spain to work in her home country for the first time at the end of 2016. Within CSG, she has developed a successful internationalization strategy of the Galician healthcare and social care companies, attracting public funding and investment for the ecosystem and the region. She has also placed CSG as a direct channel of communication between regulators, providers and users and has signed several regional, national and international collaboration frameworks agreements within sectors which have increased synergisms at a global level. As a highlight of her trajectory in CSG it is the set-up of the Galician social care living labs ITGALL where tech/digital based solutions for a healthy and active ageing are tested following person care protocols and wellbeing indicators are implemented
Dubravka Šuica
Since December 2019, Dubravka Šuica is Vice-President of the European Commission in charge of Democracy and Demography. Mrs Šuica a Croatian politician from the city of Dubrovnik, where she served for two terms as its first female mayor and was awarded the 2006 World Mayor Award. Dubravka Šuica entered politics in the 1990s as a Member of the Croatian Democratic Union and served as a Member of the Croatian Parliament and Vice-Chair of the EU Integration Committee. Between 2004 and 2009 she was a Board Member of the Union of the Association of Towns and Municipalities of the Republic of Croatia. During ten years she was the Vice-President of Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe. From 2013 to 2019 Dubravka Šuica served as a Member of the European Parliament and Vice-Chair of Foreign Affairs Committee. In June 2019, Šuica was elected as first Vice-Chair of EPP Group in the European Parliament. Since 2012, she is the Vice-President of EPP Women.
Nick Guldemond
Prof. Nick Guldemond holds degrees in medicine and electric engineering and a PhD from Maastricht University. He is the CEO and founder of the Medical Field Lab which focuses on innovation and medical curriculum development. In 2017, he became Professor healthcare and public health at Sechenov Medical University and Leiden University Medical Center in the Netherlands. In this role, he is an advisor on transformation of health systems across the globe. Prof. Guldemond worked as a clinical researcher on numerous health innovation projects, often in collaboration with partners in the pharmaceutical, medtech, health IT and finance sectors. As a key expert on eHealth and integrated care, he is an Expert Member of the WHO Working Group Digital Health and a consultant for eHealth programmes in various countries, NGO’s, multi-nationals and start-ups. Prof. Guldemond also serves as the coordinator of EU EIP on Healthy and Active Ageing and is a member of the ISO Strategic Advisory Group on Ageing Societies. He is also an associate editor for the Journal of Integrated Care and served as a member of the editorial board of the European Medical Journal from 2017-2021.
Jukka Lähesmaa
Jukka Lähesmaa is coordinating various social and health sector research, development and innovation as well as digitalization activities on the Health Sector Growth Strategy framework. He is working at the Permanent Secretary’s Office that is a management support unit. He’s main responsibilities at the moment include implementation of the Secondary use of social and health data Act and coordinating artificial intelligence and robotics development. Earlier at the Ministry, he had the responsibility of coordinating the national level process and data system developments as well as developing the programme and project management for the administrative sector of social affairs and health. He has been working at the Ministry for 9 years. Lähesmaa has worked in various management and development duties for the past 25 years. He’s assignments have considered mainly organizational, process and digitalization development in public administration. Before the Ministry Lähesmaa has had various management and development assignments as a consulting director, management consultant and research scientist.
Irina Kalderon Libal
Irina Kalderon Libal is a Policy Officer in Unit “eHealth, Wellbeing and Ageing “ DG CONNECT, European Commission. Her work is focused on digitalisation of health and care systems, ageing and wellbeing with digital technologies, Health Innovation Ecosystems, eHealth deployment in EU Regions, Digital Health Skills and AI in Health. Before joining DG CONNECT, Irina worked in the Commission's Directorate-General for Regional and Urban Policy (DG REGIO), The Office of the High-Commissioner for Human Rights (Sustainable development and Human Rights) and UNESCO (Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission), among other things.