European research agenda for better patient care in radiation applications
09.10.2023 -
The team led by Prof. Dr. Christoph Hoeschen from the Chair of Medical Systems Technology at Otto von Guericke University Magdeburg played a leading role in the development of a European research agenda for the use of ionising radiation in medical applications that has just been published. The aim of the scientific agenda is to gradually improve healthcare for patients in Europe.
As part of the research project EURopeAn MEDical application and Radiation prOteCtion Concept: strategic research agenda aNd ROadmap interLinking to heaLth and digitisation aspects EURAMED rocc-n-roll, the scientists coordinated the collaboration of 29 leading research institutions in 17 European countries with regulatory authorities, industry representatives and patient organisations.
Together, they evaluated the current state of research on the medical use of ionising radiation and identified areas where substantial research is still needed. Another focus in the development of the scientific catalogue of topics was on the question of how new therapeutic procedures and medical technology developments can be integrated more effectively into everyday clinical practice in the future.
The agenda published under the title Improving Patient Care through Novel and Optimised Medical Applications of Ionising Radiation - A Strategic Research Agenda provides for the first time an overview, shows still existing knowledge gaps and defines a resulting pan-European research need. In all these research areas, scientists expect enormous progress and success through the use of AI.
In a second published document entitled European Research Roadmap for Medical Applications of Ionising Radiation for Better and Individualised Healthcare to Improve Patients' Lives, the scientists involved in EURAMED jointly presented processes for prioritising research needs and concepts for the research funding required for this.
Excellent health care in Europe
According to Hoeschen, the European research agenda ensures that Europe remains at the forefront of cutting-edge health technologies and provides its citizens with equal access to safe, high-quality and personalised care.
The EURAMED-rocc-n-roll project ran from September 2020 to August 2023 and brought together experts from various disciplines, including radiology, interventional radiology, nuclear medicine, radiotherapy, radiological engineering, radiobiology, medical physics and dosimetry, ethics, clinical, health policy, AI as well as industry.
"We are very pleased to publish these documents, which are the result of three years of intensive interdisciplinary collaboration between our consortium and participating stakeholders," says Prof Hoeschen.
For more information on the EURAMED-rocc-n-roll project, visit https://roccnroll.euramed.eu/.
To the documents:
- "Improving Patient Care through Novel and Optimised Medical Applications of Ionising Radiation - A Strategic Research Agenda": roccnroll.euramed.eu/scientific-research-agenda
- European Research Roadmap or Medical Applications of Ionising Radiation for Better and Individualised Healthcare to Improve Patients' Lives: roccnroll.euramed.eu/roadmap