Today is the World Stroke Day, a medical condition that affects to 14.5 million people every year and it is the leading cause of death in women and the second cause in men. Health innovation contributes speeding up recovery of patients and it drastically reduces the number of visits to clinic as well as the duration of treatment in hospitals and therapy centres. It also reduces costs at the health public system. In these cases, technology can be a powerful ally, as can be seen from EIT Health Innovation Projects. EIT Health Spain, the Spanish Co-Location Center (CLC) of EIT Health, is headquartered at the Barcelona Science Park.

According to World Stroke Campaign, this year 14.5 million people will have a stroke and 5.5 million people will die as a result. This disease is the leading cause of disability worldwide and the 2nd leading cause of death.

The main challenge that survivors face is to restore their quality of life and to gain mobility in particular. Some EIT Health projects facilitate stroke rehabilitation from home and reduce patient transfers to hospitals or therapy centres while ensuring clinical effectiveness of the exercises thanks to the combination of video games and virtual reality.

One of these projects is RGS@HOME (Rehabilitation Gaming System at Home), a system that uses virtual reality to assist patients with motor and cognitive recovery after a stroke. This project is the result of more than 15 years of research in brain theory and the adaptation of ICT techniques to neurorehabilitation. The total investment executed to this point surpasses €10 million. The EIT Health framework and funding allowed a partnership gathering the whole spectrum of public and industrial stakeholders from three European regions with both public and mixed private/public reimbursement models (Sweden, France and Spain).

EIT Health partners in this project –led by Paul Verschure, ICREA Research Professor at the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) based in the Barcelona Science Park– are the Parc Sanitari Sant Joan de Déu (PSSJD), the Barcelona Institute of Science and Technology (BIST), Fondation de l’Avenir pour la Recherche Médicale Appliquée, Region Uppsala, and the companies Medtronic and Eodyne Systems.

Another project is MERLIN (acronym of hoMEcare aRm rehabiLItatioN), a system that uses a robotic assistant, software games and a remote connection to a therapist to allow post-stroke patients with upper-limb impairment to undergo physical rehabilitation at home. With this system, disabled patients can improve their upper-limb mobility and reduce by 50% their visits to the doctor or therapist. It also showed a 10-20% increase in the effectiveness of treatment thanks to the direct communication with the therapist and to the ability of patients to manage their own health. Beyond patients, beneficiaries will include payors. It is estimated that MERLIN could reduce the cost of treatment to the public health systems by more than 25%.

This project –led by Ainara Garzo, Senior Researcher at TECNALIA Research & Innovation is an example of collaboration with partners accross European borders, including experts in innovastion at Tecnalia, in medical rehabilitation at the Andalusian Health System (SAS) and Juha Hijmans and Corry van der Sluis of University Medical Centre Groningen, in technology and business at GMV, and in medical devices manufacturing at PROXIMA d.o.o. 

Public–private collaboration is key to succeed

Collaboration amongst different organisations and companies is a major part of EIT Health’s contribution. The institute allowed integration and validation of the system in home settings, first in a usability test in Spain and then in a study of effectiveness in The Netherlands. EIT Health also supported advances in the CE marking procedure of the system and development of a business model and market strategy – to ensure success in the market.

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