EIT Health: Morn­ing Health Talks

EIT Health Morn­ing Health Talks – Events for Health­care Transformation

How Open Inno­va­tion can con­tribute to the Trans­for­ma­tion of Health­care in the InnoS­tars countries

Łukasiewicz Research Net­work – PORT Pol­ish Cen­ter for Tech­nol­o­gy Devel­op­ment orga­nizes the sec­ond edi­tion of PORT for Health: Oncol­o­gy con­fer­ence, where we con­verge to explore the lat­est break­throughs in three piv­otal oncol­o­gy-relat­ed domains: can­cer biol­o­gy, can­cer ther­a­py, and can­cer neu­ro­science. Our pri­ma­ry mis­sion focus­es on advanc­ing new ther­a­peu­tic avenues for onco­log­i­cal dis­eases. This con­fer­ence serves as a bea­con for col­lab­o­ra­tion, offer­ing a plat­form for sci­en­tists, clin­i­cians, and indus­try lead­ers to engage in dynam­ic dis­course, exchange knowl­edge, and cat­alyze trans­for­ma­tive projects. The con­fer­ence will take place on 19 – 20 Sep­tem­ber 2024. We have 19 speak­ers from all over the world, who agreed to come to Wrocław and deliv­er talks focused on dif­fer­ent aspects of can­cer. The agen­da is avail­able on the con­fer­ence web­site: https://​health​.port​.org​.pl/

Morn­ing Health Talks will be a satel­lite event dur­ing the con­fer­ence held on the 20th of Sep­tem­ber in the morning.

The con­fer­ence will bring togeth­er many diverse stake­hold­ers from Poland and abroad (sci­en­tists, clin­i­cians, biotech/​pharma rep­re­sen­ta­tives) who will form an audi­ence of EIT Health’s Morn­ing Health Talks and direct­ly ben­e­fit from the pan­el discussions.

Can­cer research con­tin­ues to deliv­er huge­ly suc­cess­ful inno­va­tions. Each year brings more and bet­ter ther­a­peu­tic drugs. New med­ical tech­nolo­gies, such as CAR T‑cell ther­a­py, are improv­ing out­comes and our under­stand­ing of can­cer has nev­er been so advanced.

Sim­i­lar­ly, can­cer care has seen improve­ments in the speed and accu­ra­cy of diag­nos­tic pro­ce­dures; the effec­tive­ness of surgery, radi­a­tion ther­a­py and med­ical treat­ments; the pow­er of infor­ma­tion tech­nol­o­gy; and the devel­op­ment of mul­ti­dis­ci­pli­nary, spe­cial­ist-led approach­es to care. Yet, glob­al­ly the num­ber of can­cer deaths has increased by 40% in just over a decade.

Large fund­ing projects geared towards high-tech sci­ence devel­op­ment (the recent­ly relaunched Can­cer pro­gram in the UK, or the EU Mis­sion on Can­cer with the very ambi­tious Beat­ing Can­cer Plan) are undoubt­ed­ly well-inten­tioned. How­ev­er, with­out a com­ple­men­tary invest­ment in research into imple­men­ta­tion, the result is like­ly to be increas­ing­ly inequitable can­cer care glob­al­ly, focused on incre­men­tal advances that only a small minor­i­ty of patients can access. Per­haps the idea of inno­va­tion in can­cer research and can­cer care needs to be redefined.

With­in this con­text, it is crit­i­cal to bal­ance the invest­ment in inno­va­tion with the need to ensure the sus­tain­abil­i­ty of health­care bud­gets, and this is a glob­al con­cern where Open Inno­va­tion can help.

Pan­el dis­cus­sion top­ic:

How can Open Inno­va­tion con­tribute to the trans­for­ma­tion of CAN­CER care?

Descrip­tion: Deci­sions on inno­va­tions should take into account their long-term impact on patient out­comes and costs, not just their imme­di­ate costs. Adopt­ing a cul­ture of inno­va­tion requires a mul­ti­dis­ci­pli­nary team approach, with the patient at the cen­ter and an inte­gral part of the team.

Invit­ed pan­elists will rep­re­sent dif­fer­ent par­ties inter­est­ed and engaged in bio­med­ical inno­va­tions, and will share their per­spec­tives on Open Inno­va­tions in this field. We plan to invite rep­re­sen­ta­tives from indus­try, aca­d­e­m­ic insti­tu­tions, fund­ing bod­ies, NGOs but also health­care providers, and local author­i­ties to the panel. 

The dis­cus­sion will be focused on how to recal­i­brate research pri­or­i­ties and uti­lize Open Inno­va­tion to max­i­mize the ben­e­fit for patients. We will dis­cuss the oppor­tu­ni­ties and risks of the Open Inno­va­tion Ini­tia­tive: How to sup­port inno­va­tions in the Pol­ish (oncol­o­gy) ecosys­tem and bring them to society.

Pro­posed themes for the discussion:

  • How do we define inno­va­tion in can­cer care and what role does Open Inno­va­tion play here?
  • How does one mea­sure the val­ue of innovation?
  • What are the bar­ri­ers to the devel­op­ment and uptake of innovation?
  • Improv­ing access to inno­va­tion in can­cer care: poten­tial solu­tions based on Open Innovation

Con­firmed pan­el speakers:

Michał Malewicz, PhD, in 2019 he moved back to Ger­many to work as the Head of Mol­e­c­u­lar Biol­o­gy at an ear­ly-stage biotech Genome Bio­log­ics, where he had direct­ed the team work­ing on nov­el human heart organoid tech­nol­o­gy. From the end of 2020, Michal is direct­ing the Lab­o­ra­to­ry of Genome Dynam­ics (Łukasiewicz – PORT, Poland), where his group focus­es on the mech­a­nisms of DNA dam­age respons­es and their con­nec­tion to can­cer devel­op­ment uti­liz­ing CRISPR/​Base edit­ing genome edit­ing tech­nolo­gies and advanced mod­els of dis­ease such as IPSC-derived human organoids. From the begin­ning of 2022, Michal had been appoint­ed as the Direc­tor of Life Sci­ence and Biotech­nol­o­gy Cen­tre at Łukasiewicz – PORT.

Moni­ka Litwin, PhD, and R&D man­ag­er. She works as a sci­en­tist and man­ag­er with more than 10 years of expe­ri­ence in the biotech and clin­i­cal sec­tors. Moni­ka obtained a PhD in tumor biol­o­gy from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Wrocław and com­plet­ed post­grad­u­ate stud­ies in Project Man­age­ment at Wro­claw Uni­ver­si­ty of Eco­nom­ics. Fol­low­ing her post-doc­tor­al stud­ies, she worked at phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal and biotech com­pa­nies, focus­ing pri­mar­i­ly on clin­i­cal tri­als and immuno-oncol­o­gy drug devel­op­ment. At the biotech com­pa­ny Pure Bio­log­ics, she led the devel­op­ment of a bifunc­tion­al anti­body, advanc­ing it to clin­i­cal phase 0 in 2024. Cur­rent­ly, at the Oncol­o­gy Cen­tre, she leads and over­sees inter­na­tion­al research projects, ensur­ing they are sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly robust, inno­v­a­tive, and clin­i­cal­ly rel­e­vant.
 

Marek Kozlows­ki, PhD MScEng com­bines 20 years of expe­ri­ence in research, indus­try and com­pa­ny build­ing across Life Sci­ence & Health­care with a focus on ther­a­peu­tics, diag­nos­tics and lab tools. Marek is cur­rent­ly a Senior Invest­ment Direc­tor at NRW.Venture and a board direc­tor at 4TEEN4 Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals, Sphin­goTec, Aba­los Ther­a­peu­tics, Resolve Bio­sciences and Emer­gence Ther­a­peu­tics (sold in 2023). Marek is a trained biotech­nol­o­gist (War­saw Uni­ver­si­ty) and mol­e­c­u­lar biol­o­gist (Euro­pean Mol­e­c­u­lar Biol­o­gy Lab­o­ra­to­ry and Lud­wig Max­i­m­il­ian University).

Marek Sipow­icz, MD and PhD with 25 years of expe­ri­ence in clin­i­cal research and drug devel­op­ment in oncol­o­gy (hema­tol­ogy and sol­id tumors), neu­ropsy­chi­a­try, meta­bol­ic and car­dio­vas­cu­lar dis­eases. Spe­cial­ist gyne­col­o­gist edu­cat­ed in Poland, com­plet­ed post­doc­tor­al fel­low­ship at the Nation­al Can­cer Insti­tute in Bethes­da, USA. Dur­ing his career, respon­si­ble for ini­ti­at­ing and man­ag­ing glob­al phase I‑IV clin­i­cal tri­als, includ­ing mor­bi-mor­tal­i­ty tri­als on a large patient pop­u­la­tion; for over 20 years in exec­u­tive posi­tions at Servi­er, an inter­na­tion­al phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal com­pa­ny, serv­ing as Direc­tor of Clin­i­cal Oper­a­tions (in oncol­o­gy) at the com­pa­ny’s head­quar­ters in France and Direc­tor of Clin­i­cal Research and Drug Devel­op­ment in Australia.

Michał Woy­czyńs­ki is a mem­ber of the Mar­ket­ing and Com­mu­ni­ca­tion team in Sav­ing Kids with Can­cer Foun­da­tion — one of the largest foun­da­tions in Poland for chil­dren in pae­di­atric oncol­o­gy. He has expe­ri­ence in busi­ness com­mu­ni­ca­tion, copy­writ­ing and Pub­lic Rela­tions, which, in con­junc­tion with his edu­ca­tion in ped­a­gogy and jour­nal­ism, gives him a unique insight into the needs and pos­si­ble solu­tions for young patients’ problems.While work­ing at the Foun­da­tion, he has par­tic­i­pat­ed in the cre­ation of the annu­al report, the largest pub­lic cam­paign for tax-relat­ed dona­tions in Poland, as well as sev­er­al events and actions of var­ied scale, includ­ing two edi­tions of Gold September.