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I am delighted that EPF has embarked on a one-year campaign on patient empowerment and the support that this is receiving from many health stakeholders who participated in our launch conference. When I think back to when we created EPF 12 years ago, enabling patients to become active at all levels was one of the fundamental aims for […]

When it comes to speaking about diseases and their impact on patients, carers and families, we don’t normally jump at the chance to talk about incontinence. Many people are embarrassed to discuss it – whether it be from their own experience, from supporting family members suffering from it, or because it just isn’t as sexy as diabetes and cardiovascular disease (which have similar prevalence rates). But we need to talk about incontinence.

Throughout the EU, Member States are looking for ways to provide patient-centred care to maximize clinical outcomes and improve cost-effectiveness for healthcare systems. For many countries, this means re-organisation of how care is delivered and in some cases general cost-cutting to sustain the system. So, when policymakers are faced with difficult decisions about how to maintain quality of care within a resource constrained system why is it that they should care about dialysis?

Pacemakers help regulate slow or skipping heartbeats through electrical currents that run via leads to the heart. Since the first artificial one was implanted into Arne Larsson in 1958, modern pacemakers have become a bit smaller than the size of a matchbox, weighing around 20-50g. While current pacemakers run to a set pattern, we’re working […]

The work we do at the Helen Hamlyn Centre for Design at the Royal College of Art in London focuses on developing projects with a strong emphasis on identifying and understanding everyday situations that people have difficulty with.  Our approach is inclusive: we work with many ‘users’ of a product, service or system in order […]

Does Europe have a proper start-up culture? Are we doing enough for young professionals? According to Neelie Kroes, Vice-President of the European Commission, in her article for the World Economic Forum, we could do more to make Europe fertile ground for start-ups, and engage the youngest generation entering the workforce. As a young professional in Brussels well-acquainted with millennial woes, I was eminently interested in the views of an established and influential official at the European Union.

The rapid ageing of the European population has urged the need for prevention and proper treatment of age-related diseases. Amongst these priorities and priority diseases, Cataract is today the major cause of vision impairment of senior citizens worldwide, responsible of 48 % of blindness around the globe.

With its Contract for a Healthy Future,  the medical technology industry acknowledges its role and responsibility in maintaining high-quality, affordable healthcare in Europe despite an ageing population and constrained budgets. This industry commitment offers the much needed solutions to prove that innovation is not a cost driver but a facilitator for driving healthcare quality and efficiency in the future.  From personalized medicine to disease monitoring, the role of the diagnostics industry will be crucial in managing healthcare spending.

As the 2013 World Salt Awareness Week calls for “Less Salt, Please”, it may be time for Europeans to seriously consider the implications of their seasoning habits on their health, notably their heart health. Heart failure (HF) is characterised by the inability of the heart to respond to the blood flow demands of the body, a condition that is becoming increasingly common, with more than 20 million directly affected worldwide.