This year we are increasingly involved in Cancer Care as we would like to show the value-add of our technologies in cancer care pathways. We were happy to support ESTRO earlier this year and actively participated at the event hosted by MEP Lieve Wierinck and organised by the Marie Curie Legacy Campaign. We had very constructive interactions and identified ways to jointly address current gaps. Today, we are happy to share with you a report written by Science Business on Breast Cancer Study and identifying the value of imaging radiotherapy and digital technologies. We believe this report should be an asset and should contribute to the Expert Panel Opinion report on "Value-based healthcare" which draft was first released on 14 May (here) and the final version is expected by 28 June.
We continue to monitor the Age Profile of imaging equipment: preliminary information and infographics were shared during ECR but a detailed publication will be soon available. Trends are not improving unfortunately, and we expect some Member States to pay more attention.
On the regulatory front in Europe, we are more and more concerned with the ability to have all element timely in place to comply with the MDR before enforcement next year and issued an Assessment recently. In addition, we organized dedicated workshop to support industries to get prepared. We count on the European Commission and Member States to take a pragmatic approach to ensure that healthcare delivery will not face any negative consequences from the implementation of the new regulation. Our statement and recommendations are available here.
COCIR and its members remain actively involved at international level as well through IMDRF to ensure global regulatory convergence.
This year we had a very successful and well attended General Assembly, during which we proudly presented our new logo and we also held an event on Artificial intelligence, with speakers from the European Commission and our partner from scientific societies. Read more and download our white paper here. In addition we released our manifesto Realising Europe’s Future Potential in Health - The time to act is NOW! is available here. Which will be further enriched with additional elements on what are industries expectations for the next 5 years.
As you know this year is rather critical especially with what is happening with the European Elections. We congratulate all newly elected and re-elected members of the European Parliament ! Political support for ensuring broader EU wide uptake of innovative technologies remains vital.
More news to follow in this exciting year which is also the year we are celebrating our 60th years Anniversary!
Nicole Denjoy
June 2019