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July 18, 2024

INESC's Cutting-Edge AI Innovations in Health Systems

Advancing Intelligent Care: Bridging AI and Health Systems through INESC Innovations  

This year, at Encontro Ciência 2024 (Porto, 3-5 July 2024), the INESC group hosted the session “Advancing Intelligent Care: Bridging AI and Health Systems through INESC Innovations” under the conference motto “Science for Health and Global Well-Being“. This event brought together researchers from the five INESC institutions – INESC Coimbra, INESC-ID, INESC-MN, INESC INOV, and INESC TEC – along with healthcare stakeholders. 

“Encontro Ciência” is the major science conference organized by the Portuguese Government through the Ministry of Science, Technology, and Higher Education (MCTES), Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT), Universidade do Porto, and Ciência Viva. Held annually, the conference highlights Portugal’s key achievements in science and technology. 

 The session focus on significant R&D&I contributions towards Intelligent Care at the INESCs, highlighting the emerging contributions from the research institutes across four major pillars:  

  1. Prospects for Smart Monitoring and Pathology Screening: Microelectronics and nanotechnologies for biosensing; Federated pan-European health data management infrastructures;  
  2. Intelligent Medical Decision (including precision diagnosis, prognosis, prescription): Ongoing breakthroughs in the scope of healthy aging and chronic, infectious, neurological, psychiatric, and oncological diseases; Responsible AI; Successful hospital deployment of XR to aid medical training and decision-making;  
  3. Intelligent Treatment to Restore and Promote Health: Care optimization, control & planning (radiotherapy, anesthesia, rehabilitation); Robotic systems and intelligent agents for critical handling and social care; Multi-omics data analysis for novel molecular therapies; Micro-organisms in point-of-care;  
  4. Key Enabling Principles for Effective Intelligent Care: Governance guidelines, attitudes, policies, and SMART action plans;  

Moderated by Alípio Jorge (FCUP and INESC TEC), the session featured engaging presentations showcasing innovative projects from the five research institutions. Joana Dias (University of Coimbra and INESC Coimbra), kicked off the presentstions with her work on “Reinforcement Learning and Quadratic Optimization for Optimal Radiotherapy Treatment Planning.” Following her, Ana Madureira (ISEP and INESC INOV) introduced the ambitious “eHospital4Future” project, which aims to build a digitally skilled and innovative hospital for the future. Diogo Caetano (Técnico and INESC MN) shared the insights from the Bactometer Project which utilizes spintronics and machine learning for rapid detection of multi-resistant bacteria. Rui Henriques (Técnico and INESC ID) highlighted ongoing advances in human health technologies in several reserch fields ongoign at INESC-ID. Rounding out the presentations, Hélder P. Oliveira (FCUP nad INESC TEC), discussed the project AI4Lungs and the development of AI-based personalized care for respiratory diseases using multi-modal data for patient stratification. 

The session also featured contributions from Dr. Cristina Barbara (Unidade Local de Saúde de Santa Maria and the Faculty of Medicine, University of Lisbon) and Dr. Tatiana Pinheiro (Director of the Innovation and Projects Department at Unidade Local de Santo António). They provided valuable insights into the adoption of new technologies, digital literacy, regulation, and the future perspectives for AI technologies in clinical settings. Their discussions emphasized the significant gains achieved through the partnerships established by the showcased projects. 

This session offered a glimpse into the cutting-edge research and technological advancements happening across these institutions, with examples of EU-funded projects. It positioned INESC Group institutions as entities of reference in AI for Health within a European competitive environment, potentially serving as a foundation for future institutional collaboration initiatives. 

Sílvia Castro
Head of the Innovation Management Office at INESC-ID

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