First of the Interregional Learning Events held in Trzebnica

The partners of the HERCULES project attended the first of five scheduled meetings in Poland on the 11th and 12th as part of the Interreg Europe project to share best practices in the field of personalised medicine focused on active and healthy ageing.

HERCULES is a project led by the Galician Health Knowledge Agency (ACIS) and involves collaboration and participation from various European partners to achieve the proposed goals across six countries: University of Twente (Netherlands), Regional Development Fund of Attica (Greece), Municipality of Aarhus (Denmark), Västerbotten Region (Sweden), Emilia-Romagna Region (Italy), and St Jadwiga of Silesia Hospital in Trzebnica (Poland).

In 2019, more than one-fifth of the European Union's population was aged 65 or older, and projections indicate that the percentage of people aged 80 or older will double. On the other hand, the Covid-19 crisis has shown us the importance of innovations that will undoubtedly help the inevitable transformation of health systems into a more proactive, preventive, and personalised process.

The HERCULES project aims to develop a strategic plan at the European level for the deployment of solutions in the healthcare environment that address this issue, based on an analysis of the vulnerabilities, resources, and capabilities of the involved regions. The participation of all stakeholders in the quintuple helix (citizens, regional authorities, companies, investors, and academia) will be sought.

At the meeting, attendees were able to share the current situation in each of the regions participating in the project, as well as strengths and areas for improvement, as a preliminary step to identifying best practices to share. The host, the partner region of Wroclaw led by Saint Jadwiga Slaska Hospital and the region of Trzebnica, took advantage of the meeting to tour and learn about the plans of the aforementioned hospital and autonomous region, as well as the health plans of the region's Technology Park and LifeScience HUB.