The Eucomed blog
Thank you for visiting the Eucomed blog. In this corner of our website, you will be able to read about trends, issues, opinions and views about the medical technology industry.
The world around us is changing rapidly and these changes, while sometimes challenging, offer opportunities for everybody if all healthcare players work together towards a common objective. From austerity measures in procurement over late payments to lack of innovation stimuli - the challenges are plentiful. But so are the possibilities in the area of eHealth, Health Technology Assessment and regulation, to name but a few.
And these are just the sort of topics that will be tackled in this blog - by me, my colleagues, experts from the medical technology and our "partners in health". It is an open and frank forum of personal views and we invite you to participate in the discussion by leaving behind a comment.
That's what the Eucomed blog is all about: sharing ideas, musings and opinions. It's medtech news, with a twist!
Enjoy the read.
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13 February 2012 @ 12:20
Too often we, as stakeholders in health, forget about whom we are talking when we say “patients.” We talk as if the patient is somewhere far away from our discussions [...]
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07 February 2012 @ 13:59
When UBM Canon decided to launch the MEDTEC EMDT Innovation Awards, the PIP implant affair was not front-page news. The organisers merely thought that the contributions made by Europe’s medical [...]
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27 January 2012 @ 08:30
In October last year, Eucomed published a press release to introduce to its broader membership and stakeholders the launch of a new “Conference vetting system” in 2012. Aimed to simplify [...]
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17 January 2012 @ 15:00
Most of you know that John Wilkinson has left the position of Eucomed Chief Executive at the end of last year. And even though John’s decision was announced already in [...]
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11 January 2012 @ 13:40
Since the French authorities made their announcement just prior to Christmas, the PIP case has generated a large amount of press and political attention. Quite rightly, the main focus is [...]
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07 January 2012 @ 08:51
Medical device manufacturers routinely design products that, even a few short years ago, were the stuff of science fiction. And let’s not even mention the amazing research underway today that [...]
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01 December 2011 @ 09:30
Incontinence is a condition that often gets associated with age. When we think about incontinence we tend to think first about elderly people and that’s normal because over 60%[1] of [...]
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14 November 2011 @ 15:35
Universal Health Coverage (UHC) has become a hot topic among the international health community. I am sure that for all healthcare stakeholders achieving UHC would be like a dream come [...]
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03 November 2011 @ 10:25
As the Euro zone crisis threatens to precipitate a much more fundamental questioning of the European dream, it is easy to revert to the eurosceptic homeland of vilifying apparently meaningless [...]
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12 October 2011 @ 14:00
My wife and I are part of the problem. Last weekend we ran respectable 10 kilometre times although we are both in the latter half of our fifties and we [...]
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04 October 2011 @ 10:53
Innovation delivers better quality at lower total cost in all walks of life. Many of the things that are freely available today and widely used were considered unaffordable luxuries for [...]
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16 September 2011 @ 14:32
My pulse is already racing at the prospect of this year’s MedTech Forum. The sequence of events following the 2008-2009 banking crisis has played out rather predictably with a broader [...]
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06 September 2011 @ 10:54
A current EU Medtech Market Snapshot
Europe is an important and continuously growing market for medical technology products. Driven by budgetary pressure on the payer and provider levels as well as [...]
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17 August 2011 @ 11:30
Not too long ago, I was invited to a friend’s 40th birthday party. As many other guests I came up with my best wishes and cheers stressing the benefits of [...]
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09 August 2011 @ 15:11
Next week, pharmaceutical, biotechnology and medical device companies will change the way they interact with consumers on Facebook. These changes are occurring, not based on new communications strategies or industry [...]
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03 August 2011 @ 10:59
I’m fascinated by organisations. In particular, I’m in intrigued by the way some organisations succeed at their chosen task whilst others fail. There are, of course, lots of explanations for [...]
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25 July 2011 @ 12:00
Just last week I was sitting in a presentation by a large Group Purchasing Organisation (GPO) which cited an Ernst & Young report in which hospitals had ranked their goals [...]
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18 July 2011 @ 09:12
Small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) are the lifeblood of the medical technology industry. Research in the medical technology industry, which typically occurs at the bedside not at the bench, [...]
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01 July 2011 @ 14:42
The European Commission published on 1 June its long-awaited regulation proposal on European standardization. The document consists of the proposed legislative measures which update and consolidate existing EU legislation as [...]
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22 June 2011 @ 15:22
At 95 billion Euros the European medical technology market and industry is far from insignificant. Its impact on the lives of patients combined with the ability of health systems to [...]
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09 June 2011 @ 16:08
Useful, absent, useless or simply not up to modern communication and information exchange practices, finally I’ve just seen an honest debate on the thorny subject of instructions for use for [...]
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07 June 2011 @ 15:00
eHealth is booming, hospitals, doctors, clinics, SMEs, big companies, everybody seems to be developing an app nowadays. It is great to see how many people are throwing their weight behind [...]
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30 May 2011 @ 09:53
Korn/Ferry International and Eucomed are co-organising the upcoming “How to differentiate in a changing environment?” conference taking place on 5 July 2011 in Brussels.
We have worked closely together to design [...]
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17 May 2011 @ 10:30
When health and technology go hand in hand, safe, efficient and cost-effective solutions are often the result. Realising the immense potential that these two fields possess if they are well [...]
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04 May 2011 @ 08:33
AdvaMed and Eucomed are co-organizing the upcoming International Medical Device Industry Compliance Conference, taking place on 18-20 May in London.
Both AdvaMed and Eucomed worked closely with our member companies to [...]
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14 April 2011 @ 11:15
Medicine became evidence-based a long time ago and rightfully so. So why is it that policy decisions are, still today, far from evidence-based in Europe? Why are healthcare managers and [...]
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06 April 2011 @ 13:27
Chairing a two day conference on e-health and presenting at a groundbreaking Innovation in Healthcare conference put on by DG Research has further fuelled my enthusiasm for telling the story [...]
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01 April 2011 @ 09:24
Having been involved with the medical devices industry for many years, I’ve seen how the industry has evolved using innovative solutions and has constantly embraced technological developments. Recently however I [...]
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18 March 2011 @ 10:10
Though we live in countries with well-funded and advanced healthcare settings, we all know that receiving medical treatment inevitably carries risk with it. However, less is known about the procedures [...]
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03 March 2011 @ 14:11
Everybody who has anything to do with electrical medical devices has been watching with interest the progress of the WEEE (Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Directive) and RoHS (Restriction of [...]
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17 February 2011 @ 09:25
Eucomed has recently submitted remote monitoring of implantable cardiac devices as one of its four proposals to the Active and Healthy Ageing Innovation Partnership under the European Commission’s Innovation Union [...]
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15 February 2011 @ 12:35
There are some who are claiming that the EU Commission’s formal objection to eleven standards raised at the end of last year shows that the ‘New Approach’ has shortcomings and [...]
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08 February 2011 @ 09:00
Recent events in Brussels are pointing to a fresh, healthy airing of views and more robust debate on the Recast. (By the way, I’ve noticed that everybody says ‘Recast’ but [...]
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04 February 2011 @ 09:34
As I was commuting back to Brussels last week, a copy of The Economist laid out in front of me, my eye was immediately drawn to the title of that [...]
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26 January 2011 @ 08:59
Just before the Christmas break I purchased a beautiful flat screen television of exactly the same dimensions as one that I had bought four years previously. The price was something [...]
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11 January 2011 @ 11:12
The turn of the year brings all manner of analysis of the events of one year and predictions for the year ahead. 2010 will not be fondly remembered by many [...]
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10 January 2011 @ 14:24
Eucomed published on 23 December 2010 its first Compliance Panel recommendation on the sponsorship of third party educational conferences by Eucomed members. The Panel, an independent body of three external opinion [...]
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17 December 2010 @ 09:50
Yesterday, we, at Eucomed, had our Christmas party (Happy Christmas everybody and a big thank you to all the Eucomed members and staff for everything in 2010!!). And while thinking back [...]
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15 December 2010 @ 17:16
When one of the defining minds of business education in recent years turns his attention to healthcare then people would be wise to sit up and listen. Harvard Business School [...]
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08 December 2010 @ 14:11
As one of the baby boomers and firmly fingered with responsibility for both the healthcare funding and pensions crises, it is with a very personal interest that I look at [...]
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01 December 2010 @ 09:11
A new report by the OECD makes sobering reading as it makes the point that continued expansion of spending in developed countries is unsustainable. Reading the reported highlights, a couple [...]
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19 November 2010 @ 08:00
Health and Consumer Affairs Commissioner, John Dalli, made a typically balanced speech about his vision for health on the European agenda at a meeting organised by Friends of Europe. The [...]
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18 November 2010 @ 10:12
In a time when much health industry focus is on the European Commission’s Health Directorate, DG SANCO, EU Commissioner for Research Máire Geoghegan-Quinn chose Covidien’s 20 year celebration of their [...]
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04 November 2010 @ 13:44
Any conference, congress or other important event usually involves some kind of a feedback exercise. Many event organisers even incentivise participants, for example through presents, in order to get this [...]
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22 October 2010 @ 11:14
The build up to last week’s MedTech Forum in Brussels was frenetic for the Eucomed team and left us all exhausted for the weekend. The new week brings time for [...]
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22 October 2010 @ 09:49
A year on and the mood music in Washington is very different. My return to this beautiful city, where fall colours are emerging in their full majesty, has seen a [...]
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21 October 2010 @ 17:50
Proponents of greater regulatory harmonisation and cooperation will have been heartened by FDA chief Peggy Hamburg’s comments at the Advamed 2010 conference on Wednesday 20 October. She was quick to [...]
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06 October 2010 @ 10:03
Yesterday afternoon I was fortunate enough to be invited to participate in a round table discussion organised by Motorola as part of the EU Open Days conference organised by the [...]
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01 October 2010 @ 14:02
The 7th European Healthcare Fraud & Corruption Network conference took place in Brussels at the end of September and featured high level speakers and experts. The event proved to be [...]
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29 September 2010 @ 15:56
'Never knowingly under sold' is a slogan that one major UK retailer has been using more or less continuously since 1925. I have never quite understood what it means. E-heath [...]
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23 September 2010 @ 17:04
The occasion of the annual visit of the European Chamber of Commerce in Europe afforded me the rare opportunity to meet both a group of senior industry leaders from China [...]
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07 September 2010 @ 14:25
The recent report from the European Commission into the reuse of single use medical devices reminds me of Hamlet. The Danish prince, like the Commission in their report, had to [...]
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28 July 2010 @ 16:49
Being educated as a biologist with a special interest in evolution has left an indelible imprint on my psyche. Like all of us, I suspect, the core of my education [...]
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23 June 2010 @ 16:49
Sitting on the tram this morning, flicking through my e-mails and preparing for the busy day ahead, I began to muse on the incredible impact that information technology has had [...]
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01 June 2010 @ 16:08
The blogosphere has been driven into a foment over the last week or so by a paper by Groeneveld et al entitled ‘Increasing Use of Cardiovascular Devices and Rising Health [...]
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21 April 2010 @ 10:27
Patient safety and public perception: transparency, transparency, transparency... In scanning the disparate output of the EU machine I came across a thought provoking survey of EU citizens on the subject [...]
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20 April 2010 @ 15:59
Like much of the business community I have had plenty of time for thought and reading. A 24 hour trip to Milan has turned into a five day marathon. Both [...]
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29 March 2010 @ 12:52
Talking about ethics and compliance as industry understands it within the frame of a course of Health Systems Management given at the Public Health School of the Université Libre de [...]
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11 March 2010 @ 14:24
The prominence of World Kidney Day (11th March) brings into sharp focus the changing epidemiology of our times and the impact of modern life styles of the developed world on [...]
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23 February 2010 @ 15:55
In recent weeks within the pharmaceutical industry there has been much talk of both downsizing - GSK and AstraZeneca shedding 11,000 jobs - and outsourcing of research and development, with [...]
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16 February 2010 @ 17:13
Digital technology has made a huge impact on the performance of medical technologies but, as yet, this impact has been confined to the traditional structures of healthcare delivery. Imaging has [...]
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12 February 2010 @ 14:14
It is perhaps surprising how quickly coronary angioplasty has become just another everyday procedure. As someone who has seen open-heart surgery live and witnessed the trauma and hospital resource intensity [...]
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10 February 2010 @ 10:47
An ageing frequent traveller (this time sat on a plane taking me from frigid Brussels to what I hope will be altogether better conditions in Southern Spain) I am often [...]
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16 December 2009 @ 17:15
As the true depth of the Greek debt crisis unfolds it is hard to understand why the alarm bells were not ringing long ago. In our sector alone there is [...]
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11 December 2009 @ 17:33
In an ideal world we would have the same rules on devices in each country. As patients, as we live or travel in different countries, we can be confident that [...]
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18 November 2009 @ 10:09
On the 29th October all the votes were in and it seems that nothing more than EU paperwork stands between us and our first compulsory European database for medical devices, [...]
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29 October 2009 @ 15:18
Yesterday’s report by Thomson Reuters on the real causes of excessive costs in the US healthcare system make interesting reading. Centre stage is over-treatment generated by a litigious culture which [...]
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14 October 2009 @ 13:26
A chill wind is blowing through Washington D.C. this morning and it is not just the cold front from the North blowing away the warm Autumn sun of yesterday. Yesterday, [...]
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06 October 2009 @ 10:32
I put it down to Irish politeness to always say "no" first when asked if we want something and to follow up with a "yes" when asked the second time.
"Will [...]
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29 September 2009 @ 10:58
The latest results of the Euro Health Consumer Index (www.healthpowerhouse.com) further confirm the superiority of Bismarckian social philosophy over the Beveridge approach, at least as far as the patient is [...]
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04 September 2009 @ 10:44
Watching TV the other night I came across an excellent set of ‘reportages’ into the health sector. They really showed that healthcare is a business not only for companies but [...]
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18 August 2009 @ 10:02
Returning to the daily routine after a long, and hot, summer break is always characterised by mixed feelings. Part wishes the languorous morning routines to carry on whilst other forces [...]
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22 July 2009 @ 10:05
The arcane world of credit default swaps may seem a very curious subject to stimulate the mind of a life-long medical technology man. My thoughts turned to these strange and [...]
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16 July 2009 @ 09:49
Browsing the news pages of the web I came across an article in a journal that I am not familiar with from the USA, the grandly titled U.S. News & [...]
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08 July 2009 @ 11:26
Talking about the role of the EU in the developing world EC Director General for Development Stefano Manservisi described the new approach to health development policy on a global level: [...]
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30 June 2009 @ 10:30
An interesting article in the latest issue of Clinica. David Nicolson, the CEO of the UK's National Health Service (NHS) speaking at the Innovation Expo meeting stressed the importance of [...]
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25 June 2009 @ 09:03
A crowded room at the offices of the European Policy Center yesterday afternoon. The topic of the day is "The future of medical devices in Europe". The distinguished panel includes [...]
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19 June 2009 @ 08:24
Warm summer sunshine bathed the triumphal arch of the Parc du Cinquantenaire as colleague John Brennan and I walked down the tree-lined Avenue de Tervuren to attend sister organisation COCIR's [...]
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16 June 2009 @ 17:08
On Thursday 11 June, I attended, as part of the EULAR conference in Copenhagen - Europe's largest conference on Rheumatology - the session "Structure modification in osteoarthritis: Time to update [...]
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29 May 2009 @ 11:26
Is innovation still affordable with increasingly strained healthcare budgets? How can medical innovations continued to be financed? Panelist of the round table of distinguished speakers Member of the European Parliament [...]
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29 May 2009 @ 11:20
An exclusive roundtable hosted by Johnson & Johnson during this year’s Hauptstadtkongress debated the question whether the current healthcare system in Germany should compromise between the need to standardize treatments [...]
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28 May 2009 @ 17:15
Listening to a distinguished panel of experts chaired by Bernard Merkel of DG Sanco I get the impression that things are moving to raise the level of patient safety. I [...]
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28 May 2009 @ 09:54
The sweltering heat and fever pitch of the football supporters contrasts starkly with the measured debate at the 2009 International Medical Device Industry Compliance, Regulatory and Intellectual Property Conference here [...]
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27 May 2009 @ 16:04
Germany to lower statutory health insurance tax
Germany’s minister of health, Ulla Schmidt announced today in the opening interview with public service journalist Karin P. Vanis that the contribution to [...]
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27 May 2009 @ 15:56
Sitting in the crowded main conference hall of Berlin International Congress Center (ICC) on the opening day of Germany’s largest health policy conference, the so-called Hauptstadtkongress, I am keen to [...]
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15 May 2009 @ 10:40
Just sitting at the airport after what was an excellent Global Harmonization Task Force Conference. Well done Steve Dibert and his crew, not to mention Health Canada. Who says [...]
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12 May 2009 @ 11:03
It takes very little to persuade me to visit Prague. It is one of the gems of Europe. On this occasion, though, I had little opportunity to enjoy the scenic [...]
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12 May 2009 @ 10:59
The EPC organised on May 6th a policy dialogue with the World Bank on the topic: "Russia in the global economic storm" and presented its latest Economic Report dated March [...]
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06 May 2009 @ 15:17
Sitting on Boston's south shore, the John F. Kennedy Pesidential Library is both imposing yet not over-stated. A rare treat for me was the opportunity to address the annual meeting [...]
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29 April 2009 @ 21:10
I’m just back from an extended trip to Sweden where I was invited to present at Swedish Medtech’s AGM (it was my first trip to Sweden so I tagged on [...]
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21 April 2009 @ 14:41
Finally arrived in downtown Milan after a long train ride on the so-called Malpensa Express. This rainy afternoon in Milan saw the second workshop of the European Health Technology Institute [...]
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15 April 2009 @ 16:49
Last night I attended BVMed’s well attended debate looking at the German medical technology sector in times of the economic crisis. The debate was hosted by the permanent representation of [...]
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14 April 2009 @ 14:53
Just back from Easter holidays and picked up this article from the Wall Street Journal “Medical Devices Face New Scrutiny From FDA”. When I read the article it reminded me [...]
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10 April 2009 @ 11:17
Brussels, 8 April 2009 – Eucomed welcomes revision of directive 2000/35/EC on Late Payments adopted by the European Commission today strengthening current payment obligations. Association disappointed to see final text [...]
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07 April 2009 @ 14:55
From 23 - 25 March 2009, the Drug Information Association (DIA) held its annual EuroMeeting in Berlin. During the presentation by Richard Moore, Institute of Nanotechnology, I learned that prescription [...]
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31 March 2009 @ 11:51
On one of those beautiful clear Spring mornings here in Brussels, it was a rare pleasure to head out early for breakfast with the Health Consumer Powerhouse. Housed in a [...]
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27 March 2009 @ 10:05
Today at the European Business Summit in Brussels a workshop was organized focusing on health entitled “Ageing and health: Pay for the grey”. The distinguished panel included Androulla Vassilliou, European [...]
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24 March 2009 @ 19:25
It was with some trepidation that I placed myself in the 'lions den' of the pharmaceutical industry at the annual Euromeeting of the Drug Information Association in Berlin today.
Sharing a [...]
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20 March 2009 @ 17:20
On Thursday 19 March 2009 I joined a round table discussion of Brussels-based think tank ECIPE on the topic “2009 Cross-border Healthcare in Europe and beyond.” I was very impressed [...]
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18 March 2009 @ 14:26
On Tuesday, 17 March 2009 I attended the Health First Europe round table on patient safety and healthcare associated infections (HCAIs) in the European Parliament. The session was co-hosted by [...]
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12 March 2009 @ 14:46
Hello and welcome to the Eucomed blog. This is the place to find out about the latest news on all aspects of medical technology, from financing of healthcare to European [...]