Past events
The 14th ExEx Symposium addressed the impact of regulatory requirements and clinical constraints on the development strategy for innovative medicines or medical devices, from patient needs to clinical research and market access. Key players such as Swissmedic, experts from large companies and experienced entrepreneurs, as well as associations that promote innovation, shared their experiences. They also addressed the future position of Switzerland in terms of innovation and attractiveness within the international landscape.
The participants came from different areas of development. They benefited from lively discussions and the exchange of ideas and experiences and discovered many new potential contacts.
The event closed with a lively networking apèro.
How does Personalized Medicine Impact Healthcare?
Achievements and technologies in personalised medicine and their consequences for the health care system and the individual patient.
Annual Swiss Symposium in Pharmaceutical Medicine
The two societies SwAPP (Swiss Association of Pharmaceutical Professionals) and SGPM (Schweizerische Gesellschaft für pharmazeutische Medizin) were celebrating their 25th Annual Meeting on November 25, 2020; for the first time in a virtual format. It was an amazing experience with more than 100 people listening and interacting.
Different key stakeholders in the health care system showcased the implementation of personalized medicine in their daily routine and the drug development process overall. There are many aspects, which offer new possibilities not only through tailor making of therapies but also the digitalization of the data and their capture. The handling, storage and exchange of these data require new processes and laws.
Presentations included the advantage of gene sequencing to capture the individual setup of a patient to develop new treatments. Experiences both from the big pharma and start-up industry; investigators and engineers in the hospital setting and the innovative patient organization perspectives were shared. The final presentation of the day introduced the Corona immunitas research program that investigates the spread and impact of the Corona pandemic in Switzerland. We would like to invite you to visit the website www.corona-immunitas.ch and consider supporting the initiative.
Programme http://swapp-sgpm-annual-meeting.ch/programme/index.html
Programme, Speakers and Photos you find here
Patient Centricity & Patient Engagement in Medicines Lifecycle, Market Access, Evidence-Based Healthcare, Ethics & Legal Aspects and The Digital Future were high in discussion with keynote speakers
Information, programme and photos see here
The symposium started off under a simple title: Data integrity. Two words.
At the end of the day everyone knew how wide and complex the topic is. It concerns the planning of one’s data, the controlling, protecting, maintaining, storing, analysing and sharing of data.
In the introductory talk, it was pointed out that data integrity does not only concern the health care sector, but other areas like financial flows, government data etc.
The next talk was about artificial intelligence, and how important it is to make a system learn the right things – it’s not about the weather, but about recognising the tank behind the tree! The talk also mentioned the challenges of interoperability and data sharing.
In the next talk, there was a change of subjects to pearl necklaces and the challenges of protecting a necklace. The speaker focused on different protection systems and protection levels and on risk management.
The next presentation addressed the regulations, the obligations of the data owners, and touched upon issues that are focused on in audits and inspections.
After a breathtaking piano intermezzo by Mischa Cheung,
the first talk in the afternoon focused on forensic technologies and on what happens if a theft of intellectual property or a breach of data integrity has taken place.
Then the challenges of a highly digitalised country, Estonia, were highlighted and Block Chain technology explained. It was made clear that a block chain is essentially a pin onto which sheets of paper with events are stacked.
The next talk addressed an issue in pharmaceutical medicine, namely medication fraud and medication verification, serialisation and the joint protection initiative.
Finally, the last two presentations focused on patient data: digitalised healthcare, digitalised clinical trial management and recruitment, and digital health consumers as well as the challenges, the willingness and the impact of sharing patient data.
In the name of both associations, SwAPP and sgpm, we thank the speakers for sharing their work, know-how, thoughts and time with us. We also thank the scientific organisers, the chairs and the event organiser. A special thanks to our sponsors. Without them, the symposium would not be possible. And last but not least a thank you to the interested audience for their active participation in the symposium.
Save the date and join us for our next symposium on the last Wednesday in November 2019: November 27, 2019. /ME
The ExEx symposium, organized by the SWAPP Task Force Medical Device (TFMD), was kindly hosted by the Swiss Integrative Center for Human Health SA (SICHH) in Fribourg on 8 March 2018. The symposium was a big success, bringing together more than 70 professionals of both Medical Devices and Medicinal Products to Fribourg. After a visit of the SICHH the symposium held in the afternoon offered a varied overview on innovations and regulatory changes in the field of medical devices. The symposium was opened by Daniela Gunz, Member of the Board, SwAPP (Bern, CH) and Jean-Marc Brunner, CEO, SICHH (Fribourg, CH).
The plenary session was opened and moderated by Marie Gaumet, member of the board, SwAPP. First key note speaker was Bradley Nelson, Professor of Robotics & Intelligent systems, Director of Multi-Scale Robotics Lab, ETHZ (Zurich, CH) who gave a wide insight into new fields of robotics and new uses of medical devices. Successful developments from bench to patients have been demonstrated. Impressive research on micro robotics were presented.
Ulla Grauschopf, Head of Device Development Europe, F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd (Basel, CH) followed in the key note session and detailed the collaboration between medicinal product and medical device development within one company. Early communication and common understanding between medicinal product and medical device departments is key for success and learnings can be made by both sides.
The key note sessions were closed by Bassil Akra, Vice-President, TÜV SÜD Product Service GmbH (Munich, D) in a talk about the European Medical Device Regulation: Timelines and Impact. He clearly showed the importance of the industry to carefully consider the new regulations and to take actions immediately in order to comply with the new regulatory demands.
Three workshops followed the key note speeches. Workshops with a mixed auditorium were challenging but were well conducted and excellently moderated by Eckhart Wildi, Medical & Regulatory Affairs Merz Pharma (Schweiz) AG, Dominique Pioletti, Laboratory of Biomechanical Orthopedics, EPFL, Lausanne Switzerland and Dorothee Heer, Managing Director, SwAPP.
Priscilla Brunetto R&D Project Leader, University of Fribourg (Fribourg, CH) and Vanya Loroch, CEO Loroch CTLS (Essertines-sur-Rolle, CH) presented in a first workshop how the Biomaterials used in medical devices can interact with Body Biological Barriers.
Christa Spitznagel, Sr Regulatory Affairs Manager Alpine, Allergan AG (Zurich, CH) and Ivo Schauwecker, Manager Clinical Services, AO Foundation (Zurich, CH) held the second workshop on Medicinal Products versus Medical Devices: Reaching the Market. Difference between medicinal product and medical device development were explored.
The third workshop was about Strategies in Clinical Evaluations held by Kathrin Abegg, Clinical & Regulatory Affairs Manager, ISS AG (Biel, CH) and about Person Responsible for Regulatory Compliance: Roles & Responsibilities, held by Rainer Voelksen, Co-Chair RAPS EU Advisory Committee (Geneva, CH). The two topics were ideal examples to show some of the new challenges the medical device industry is facing nowadays.
The closing remarks were performed in a very clearly manner by Michel Weber, Head Clinical Services, ISS AG (Biel, CH). He also outlined planned activities in medical devices by SwAPP.
SwAPP would like to thank Marie Gaumet, chair of the task force medical device and the members of the task force, Laetitia Galea, Rainer Voelksen and Michel Weber for organising the 2018 ExEx Event.
MG
The 22nd SwAPP/SGPM Annual Symposium was held in Zurich on 29 November 2017. More than 130 participants from pharmaceutical industry (headquarters and local affiliates), academia, authorities, ethics committees, clinical research units as well as from contract and consultancy organisations attended. The professional fields of pharmaceutical medicine most strongly represented by the audience were clinical studies, medical affairs and regulatory affairs. About a third of the audience was mixed from various other fields of pharmaceutical medicine. Once again, the symposium attracted a sizeable proportion of young professionals who attended for the first time. The overall quality of the symposium and the relevance of the topics presented were rated consistently high (between good and excellent). Credit points for continued education from SwAPP/SGPM, GSASA and SKPT were awarded.
Thomas Szucs, ECPM, University Basel (CH), set the stage with a fascinating Introductory Talk on Small and Vulnerable Populations: Considerations for Drug Development. He differentiated between small and vulnerable, with the elderly and the geriatric populations being large and, in the case of the elderly, growing, but both populations are vulnerable and underrepresented in clinical studies, versus small, rare disease populations, which in 95% of cases do not have an approved treatment. He then outlined some clinical research tools to address the challenges of these populations.
This talk was followed by a session dedicated to Paedriatric Populations. Johannes van den Anker, Paediatric Pharmacology, University Children’s Hospital Basel (CH), in his talk on Pharmacological Challenges in Children, presented some impressive examples of how drug exposure varies in infants week by week with regard to age and how difficult it is to use age as a guidance for dosing. He showed a variety of biological factors that change quickly with increasing maturity and affect drug exposure in this population. Hülya Ozsahin, Clinical Reviewer, Swissmedic (Bern, CH), Critical Path Institute – Neonatology and Enpr-EMA (Representative for Swissmedic), in her presentation on Paediatric Medicines: Regulatory Issues and Insights, presented the difficulties of providing a regulatory framework for research in children and the challenges associated with pediaetric investigation plans.
The next session focused on the Geriatric Population. Florian von Raison, Therapeutic Area Head Neurodegenerative Diseases, Novartis (Basel, CH), Chairman Geriatric Medicine Working Party, EFGCP (Brussels, B), talked about Practical and Ethical Challenges in Clinical Trials with Geriatric Patients. He showed impressive numbers of the growing elderly population and their underrepresentation in clinical research, as well as the European efforts to improve research in the elderly with guidelines and dedicated programmes. He concluded with practical examples of how to attract and keep elderly persons in clinical studies. Roy Turner, Technical Project Leader, Idorsia Pharmaceuticals Ltd (Allschwil, CH), in his talk on Formulation and Administration of Drugs to Geriatric Patients, presented the challenges of developing dosage forms for elderly patients, factors that influence adherence and patient acceptability as well as packaging and labelling issues that affect handling and safety of the medicinal drugs.
The topic of Rare Diseases was covered by Robert Morgan, Head of European Regulatory Affairs Strategy, Shire (London, UK), in his presentation on Regulatory and Development Challenges of European Orphan Products, and Therese Stutz-Steiger, ProRaris (Bern, CH), with her talk on Orphan Diseases: A Patient Perspective. Robert Morgan presented the international definitions of orphan drugs and the challenges of clinical studies in rare disease. He highlighted the European regulatory incentives and the rationale behind the European regulatory framework. Therese Stutz-Steiger highlighted what the burden of a rare disease means for the patient in terms of his/her medical condition and in terms of access to medical care and social support for mastering the challenges of daily life. She concluded with a short summary about the Swiss National Rare Disease Policy.
The pre-lunch lecture addressing soft skills was given by Barbara Zenklusen, Culture Change/Transformation at CAS Digital Leadership, HWZ (Zurich, CH), Zenklusen Consulting (Küsnacht, CH). She presented tools on how to master change in organisations in her talk on Change and Transformation Management.
In summary, we are proud to look back on a lively, multifaceted and highly informative event.
MG/ME
“Interactive, lively and enriching, these are the adjectives one could use to describe the 4th SwAPP Speed Networking Event that took place on May 2nd, 2017. This human sized event, operated by the Task Force Medical Device was kindly hosted by CPA Group SA, in Villaz-St-Pierre.
After welcome by Tony Arquisch (CPA Group), the conferences given by Dominique Piguet (Medtronic) and Stéphane Porchet (Valtronic) were well appreciated and their high-level of expertise was fully exploited during the question and answer phase at the end of the talks.
The session dedicated to speed networking provided an opportunity for all participants to join in the exchange.
A visit to the facilities was then led by Marc Thurner (RegenHU) and Marcel Dubey (CPAutomation), both companies hosted by CPA Group SA. They gave interesting practical insights into the challenges of innovative development.
Delegates enjoyed continuing networking in a relaxed atmosphere during the closing apéro.”
MW