EIT Health Talk Series for Hospital Managers Comes to a Close

December marks the end of a series of webinars on innovations in hospitals that was organised by the regional Latvian hub of the Health Knowledge and Innovation Community of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT Health), which is located at Rīga Stradiņš University (RSU). The target audience of this year’s series - EIT Morning Health Talks - was Latvian hospital managers who introduce new and modern solutions to their institutions.

Experts from the two largest Finnish university hospitals – Pekka Kahri, Head of Development, Helsinki University Hospital, and Timo Alalääkkölä, Head of Testing and Innovation, Oulu University Hospital – shared their experience in the first webinar of the series, Hospital Transformation for Innovation.

The second talk in the series focused on the provision of telemedicine services in hospitals, especially in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. Valts Ābols, Chairman of the Board of the Children’s Clinical University Hospital, and Ineta Grantiņa, Chief Physician of the Clinic for Children’s Diseases, spoke about telemedicine solutions at the Children's Clinical University Hospital. Karina Beinerte, Board Member of the Latvian Medical and Dental Association, who is currently undergoing a psychiatry residency programme in London, and Kārlis Albergs, Quality Improvement Coordinator for the Central London Community Healthcare NHS Trust, joined the webinar from the UK. This webinar was organised by the EIT Health Latvian Hub in cooperation with the Ministry of Health and the Latvian Association of Large Hospitals. 

The closing speaker of this year’s EIT Morning Health Talks was Florian Rüter, Head of Quality Control and Cardiac Surgeon at the Basel University Hospital in Switzerland. He gave a lecture on the efficient use of resources to achieve high-quality patient outcomes.

The webinars were moderated by Baiba Pētersone, Director of the RSU International Department. 

Each of the EIT Morning Health Talks was attended by 50 to 70 hospital and other healthcare institution managers. They were actively engaged in asking questions and commenting on hospital work processes. Participants represented clinical university hospitals and other hospitals in Riga, as well asregional and specialised hospitals and other healthcare institutions.

‘I am very happy that the series was successful with interesting speakers and an engaged audience. The number of participants was impressive and the topics were well chosen. This is exactly what we wanted to achieve - to support the local community of healthcare experts and innovators, because this will be an excellent basis for future cooperation.

I am always pleased to hear that EIT Regional Innovation Scheme initiatives bring relevant stakeholders together and inspire our hubs to benefit from the proposed activities. I do hope you will share the good practices regarding Morning Health Talks with other hubs in the interest of sustainability of the series’ events across EIT Regional Innovation Scheme regions,' said Mónika Tóth, EIT Health RIS Programme Manager.

The EIT Morning Health Talks series is a new educational programme organised by EIT Health in 14 different European regions, adapting the webinar topics to the healthcare needs of each region. This programme for Latvian hospital managers will be continued next year. 

The work of the EIT Health Latvian Hub is coordinated by the RSU International Department.