First edition of d·Health Barcelona Part Time ends with Graduation Day
The Biocat talent development program, adapted from the d·HEALTH Barcelona program, has topped off six months of training with Graduation Day, where the four participating teams pitched their innovation projects in front of a hundred people from the sector.
The first batch of d·HEALTH Barcelona Part Time entrepreneurs have hit the streets. The Biocat talent development program adapted from d·HEALTH Barcelona completed its first edition with Graduation Day, an in-person event where the fellows pitched the projects they developed over the previous six months to address unmet clinical needs. The judges were Sergi Trilla, founder and president of Trifermed, Lina Williamson, head of Entrepreneurship at Hospital Clinic Barcelona, and Pau Turon, vice-president of R&D at Braun Group.
The projects from this edition of the program are:
MyNeuroAssist
The team that worked in the Rehabilitation Unit at Vall d’Hebron University Hospital has designed a digital platform to create an ecosystem of non-professional caregivers to build a community with access to support, information, services and contacts.
MetricsMind
The team that was in the Neurology Unit at Bellvitge University Hospital has designed a solution that monitors motor function to reduce the risk of secondary injuries in neurocritical patients, supporting healthcare professionals in decision-making and optimizing costs.
RenalScreen
The group that did their clinical immersion in the Nephrology Unit at Germans Trias i Pujol University Hospital has come up with a home test to detect albuminuria, a biomarker associated with CKD (chronic kidney disease). The idea is to connect the results to a risk calculator (app) and algorithm directly connected to the healthcare system.
DuoDit
The group at Hospital Universitari Parc Taulí (Oncology Unit) has designed a temperature-controlled glove to prevent toxicity in patients receiving chemotherapy. The device comes in a portable case where it can be stored, charged and transported.
Apart from the presentation of the projects, the event included the master session "Beyond prototypes: surfing the 'waves of maket trends in health" led by Sergi Trilla. In this session he talked about the need for synergy and the importance of teamwork, making special mention of networking and the need to change the idea of ownership of a network of contacts towards sharing it with others. In addition, Sergi Trilla highlighted the 3 key elements that make a startup generate confidence in investors: authenticity, logic and empathy. On the other hand, he also remarked that you have to show passion for what you do, but at the same time you have to show that you have the skills to do it.
Graduation Day was the final event after three days of pitch training and preparation, where the teams worked with experts on the best way to seduce investors.
Clinical immersion, key to the program
From the beginning of the program in March, the four teams have been working on an innovative health project to address an unmet clinical need they detected during their clinical immersion at a hospital. Each team created a technological solution and developed a business idea based on the challenge, using the Stanford University biodesign methodology.
This is one of the most attractive aspects of the program, as fellows were able to work in different clinical areas at four benchmark hospitals in Catalonia (Hospital Universitari Parc Taulí – Oncology Unit, Hospital Universitari Vall d’Hebron – Rehabilitation Unit, Hospital Universitari de Bellvitge – Neurology Unit, Hospital Universitari Germans Trias i Pujol – Nephrology Unit).