On 9 November, the AIMS MEDICAL team, located in the Tecnocampus incubator, played a leading role in the PECT Mataró-Maresme Research Conference, which was successfully held at the Tecnocampus in Mataró.
The aim of the Scientific Conference was to establish a strategic meeting point for researchers, students, companies and professionals in the field of care. This event presented the research and innovation results of the PECT project, acting as a forum for connecting research groups with companies and organisations. It also highlighted the presentation of the new CareCityLab centre, consolidating itself as a point of reference in research, innovation and knowledge transfer in the field of care, especially for people in situations of fragility and dependence, as well as their carers.
The PECT Mataró-Maresme: innovation ecosystem for caregiving cities is the result of a transversal territorial strategy focused on smart specialisation in the field of social and health care. With a special focus on innovation, research and knowledge transfer, this programme focuses on improving the care, attention and quality of life of the most vulnerable and fragile groups, with special attention to the elderly and people with disabilities. The PECT projects organise the key elements for the economic development of a territory, aligning with the European strategy of Research and Innovation for Smart Specialisation (RIS3) and the corresponding Catalan strategy RIS3CAT.
Adil El Haji led an information stand where visitors had the opportunity to understand in depth the company’s functions, meet its dedicated team and identify the problem of under-diagnosis of dysphagia and how AIMS-OD proposes a fast, quality and cost-efficient solution. This space, equipped with two computers, allowed us to showcase AIMS-OD and highlight the exemplary work of our development team, offering a close-up view of innovation.
AIMS MEDICAL was also represented in two oral communications by two members of our team, Alberto Martín and Cristina Amadó.
Alberto Martín presented a pioneering study “Improving screening and diagnosis of oropharyngeal dysphagia in elderly patients using Machine Learning”. The objective was to create an Expert System with Machine Learning to assess the risk of oropharyngeal dysphagia in elderly patients (AIMS-OD), implementing a universal and automatic screening during hospital admission, with integration in the Mataró Hospital. The conclusions highlight that AIMS-OD predicts oropharyngeal dysphagia with high accuracy (sensitivity 0.94 and specificity 0.42), allowing systematic and universal screening during hospital admission and that more patients with dysphagia can be detected with fewer resources.
Cristina Amadó contributed another study entitled “Using machine learning to improve the detection of oropharyngeal dysphagia in patients with COVID-19”. The aim was to assess the prevalence of dysphagia in COVID-19 patients and to compare the different prevalences according to CIM-10 coding, patients at risk according to AIMS-OD and those with no known dysphagia or risk. The conclusions highlight that AIMS-OD allows rapid screening, identifying an underdiagnosis of dysphagia of 20.8% (4.6% vs. 25.4%) according to AIMS-OD and that systematic screening with this tool improves the detection of oropharyngeal dysphagia.
In addition, Cristina Amadó participated in the Thesis in 3 minutes Competition, presenting her Industrial Doctorate thesis “Application of Artificial Intelligence in the diagnosis and prevention of oropharyngeal dysphagia and aspiration pneumonia”.
AIMS MEDICAL continues to demonstrate its commitment to innovation and excellence in the field of healthcare.
Many thanks to the institutions of the Mataró-Maresme PECT ecosystem and the collaborating entities of the Day for giving us the opportunity to be part of this day.
