FUTURE HEALTH COOPERATION BETWEEN PUBLIC AND PRIVATE SECTORS IN KUOPIO Anneli Tuomainen, Johanna Jylhä-Ollila Kuopio Innovation Ltd, POB 4000, FI-70601 Kuopio, Finland Context In Finland, cities, companies and the State of Finland come together in the Innovative Cities programme (2014-2017). The aim is to create attractive local innovation hubs based in top-notch talent in: - Bioeconomy - Future health - Energy and cleantech - Smart city and renewable industry. In the Future health theme, Kuopio is doing national cooperation with other Finnish cities, especially with the other university hospital cities (Oulu, Tampere, Turku and Helsinki). Tasks in the Future health contain the following entities: - To establish attractive hubs, so called a sense of community for entrepreneurs, innovators and change agents - To utilise the best expertise and strengths of the cities in Finland - To create new companies based on expertise - To renew companies business activities - To accelerate the implementation of innovations - To pave the way for innovative solutions to enter the international market - To facilitate cooperation between users, companies and public players - Piloting of solutions in genuine development and experimental environments in the cities Rationale In the Finnish health sector, there is going on social welfare and health care reform and new strategies linked to that have been launched: There is strong need to implement those strategies, make selections and prioritize operations. There is also need to have new kind of business, utilize the best strengths of the cities and regions and customize the innovations and solutions for the health sector. - The Finnish health sector growth strategy for research and innovation activities - ehealth and esocial strategy 2020 - Information to support well-being and service renewal - Finland s national genome strategy. 1.) The Finnish Health Sector Growth Strategy for Research and Innovation Activities
Three ministries (the Ministry of Employment and the Economy, the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health, the Ministry of Education and Culture) with Tekes (the Finnish Funding Agency for Innovation) and the Academy of Finland announced the new strategy for growth in the Finnish health sector on May 2014, which was prepared in cooperation with major health sector players. The strategy contains key recommendations for action research and innovation, as well for increasing investments and achieving economic growth in the health sector in Finland. The high levels of expertise and versatility as well as business acceleration will allow Finnish health care to have faster access to the latest research and means of treatment. In addition people will benefit from new ways of promoting health and well-being. The recommendations are related to the development of research driven clusters surrounding the university hospitals, the effective national division of labour, developing the financial environment, market access for innovations, as well as launching the broad-based Team Finland Health cooperation initiative by acquiring foreign investment. The ministries involved are jointly responsible for the implementation of the strategy. The ministries have also set up a cooperation group for taking further measures, which is also responsible for monitoring and evaluating the implementation of the strategy. 2.) ehealth and esocial strategy 2020 - Information to support well-being and service renewal In the beginning of 2015 the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health published the ehealth and esocial strategy 2020 for Finland. The objective of the strategy is to support the renewal of the social welfare and health care sector and the active role of citizens in maintaining their own well-being by improving information management and increasing the provision of online services. To achieve these ends, it is essential to make active use of information related to social welfare and health care services and to refine it into knowledge that will support both the service system and individual citizens. 3.) Finland s National Genome strategy This strategy is now under way. The goal is to develop a plan including measures that will enable the efficient use of human genome data in Finnish healthcare. Genome data refers to all of the hereditary genetic information that can be obtained about a person. Description In the Future health theme, the Finnish cities and companies work together so that the innovations are quickly transferred into practical health care solutions and also into the international markets. The Kuopio region is focusing on its strengths in
health sector and intensifying the cooperation between public and private key players. The aim is to generate new business and new companies from high-quality competence, thus creating more jobs. There is close local cooperation and pooling of resources between science, education, companies and the government. The significant operators in health sector in Kuopio represent the city of Kuopio (Health services sector), Kuopio University Hospital, University of Eastern Finland, Savonia University of Applied Sciences, VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland and companies. The methods used will include new development environments, creating pioneering markets, and national and international cooperation in leveraging expertise. The methods used in the national cooperation between the cities include the following: - Health ecosystem development in collaboration - E.g. Medical ecosystem and Health technology ecosystem developing in Kuopio - Promoting health technology export sector - E.g. to China and to developing countries - Development of digital well-being services - Development of elderly home care as commercialization platform for the new innovations - Examples of projects started in Kuopio are TULETKO, Valmuska, and Mavire - Campus areas as innovation platform for companies - Building and developing the Savilahti Campus area in Kuopio - Biobanks as innovation platforms for companies - The Biobank of Eastern Finland, together with Auria Biobank, Northern Finland Biobank Borealis, Tampere Biobank etc. Achievements Kuopio is profiling in personalized care and pharmaceuticals, as well as in health and wellbeing technology. In the future, we need more personalized solutions for patient care and medication, to improve citizens own health and wellbeing. The solutions are focused at supporting the elderly people living at home, medication, nutrition, therapies, rehabilitation etc. Development of authentic testing and piloting environments are the core of Future health activities in Finland. Cities diverse testing platforms open new opportunities for cooperation between users, companies and public players in health sector. The city of Kuopio is aiming to create a piloting environment where the companies health technology products can be tested. Modelling of this piloting environment will be started after this summer. Mäntycampus is one of the piloting and testing environments in Kuopio. Mäntycampus is a living area and health center for elderly citizens. It is one of the ten compact living areas for elderly citizens in Kuopio. Effortless living and daily
services are located nearby to help residents live happy, active and safe life in their own homes as long as possible. Examples of projects started in Kuopio (and linked to Mäntycampus) are the following: 1.) TULETKO project - Safe Home Care of the Future TULETKO project started in the beginning of 2015 in the city of Kuopio, in the home care services. This 1,5 year long project running is funded by Tekes (the Finnish Funding Agency for Innocvation) and coordinated by the city (Kaija Kokkonen) and it represents a smart public innovation procurement. The city wants to create a safe yet simple electronic solution that makes it easy for carers to keep in touch with the family members of elderly people. The city also wants better use of data from the existing city systems and have more time for face-to-face interaction with the clients, which is very important. In the smart public innovation procurement, the city can e.g. prepare the procurement, have market dialogue with the different companies, define criteria, take the end-users in the process etc. Still now, there has been in Kuopio the market soundings stage, that means that the city has been actively surveyed the companies acting in the fields of health and safety technologies. The city is looking for new solutions and forms of integration that would enable it to make better use of the data they are getting from the existing systems. The goal is also to automate the basic paperwork of the carers and make it mobile. The final goal is to have more time for face-to-face interaction with the clients. 2.) VALMUSKA project Over 13 000 people are becoming demented every year in Finland. Finland has a national memory programme (2012-2020) and it has been established that the amount is raising so that by 2020 about 130 000 people have dementia. This is also a global health care problem; it has been established that by 2030 there will be globally 65,7 million people having dementia. Intelligent lighting and thermal comfort technologies for care services of homedwelling elderly people with memory disorder (VALMUSKA) -project will focus on researching and developing technologies related to intelligent lighting and thermal comfort technologies for care services of home-dwelling elderly people with Alzheimer s disease or dementia. The project is coordinated by VTT Technical Research Centre (Aki Mäyrä). New technological methods for improving quality of life and reducing behavioural symptoms will be investigated and tested in elderly care centres in cities of Kuopio and Oulu in 2015 and 2016. The research approach is based on intervention study and the data is collected by objective measurement, questionnaire and interview. Aim is to find cost effective retrofit solutions to be distributed as part of homedwelling elderly peoples living environments.
The VALMUSKA project will be realized in cooperation with City of Kuopio, City of Oulu, VTT Technical Research Centre, University of Eastern Finland, University of Oulu and nine Finnish companies. In Kuopio the technological solutions offered by the companies will be developed and tested in Mäntycampus genuine piloting environment. The results will be distributed to other actors through the Finnish Innovative Cities network. 3.) MAVIRE project Malnutrition is relatively common among older adults. It impairs the quality of life of the elderly and increases costs to the society. Increased meal frequency is important for the elderly to maintain adequate nutrition, and regular consumption of snacks in addition to main meals is recommended. The aim of MAVIRE project is to develop tasty, convenient, nutrient- and energy-dense snack-type products for the elderly at risk of malnutrition, and to investigate the effects of these products on nutritional status, functional status and well-being in the elderly using home care and meal services. The project is coordinated by the University of Eastern Finland, Institute of Public Health and Clinical Nutrition (Riitta Törrönen), and carried out in collaboration with Servica Food Services, City of Kuopio and five companies. The results will be distributed to industrial and other actors through the Finnish Innovative Cities network. The aim of the project is: - To develop tasty, nutrient- and energy-dense berry- and milk-based snacks for the elderly at risk of malnutrition - To investigate the effects of regular consumption of these products on nutritional and health status and well-being in the elderly using home care and meal services. 4.) Future ideas in Kuopio In the future, the city of Kuopio will also create a whole piloting environment for testing health technology and safety products. There is also a need to establish criteria for products to be tested. This work will be done together with other Finnish cities and share and distribute the cities best practices. In the piloting environments, the companies can test their products or solutions for the needs of public operators, and also customize them to personal home care use. The piloting environments offer an authentic platform between public players (cities, hospitals), private sector and end-users to collaborate side by side with each other. The city of Kuopio wants to disseminate and share the best practices. Kuopio is also actively looking for international cooperation with other states and cities in the elderly home care sector and smart city theme as well as in the smart public procurement processes. Conclusion
The operators in health sector in the city of Kuopio are keen to facilitate cooperation between users, companies and public players. The piloting of different solutions is accomplished in genuine development and experimental environments. When the wishes of the end user and worker are taken into consideration, for example the home care services can be customized. Where, for example, health technology companies and the city of Kuopio bring their own expertise, Kuopio Innovation brings the different parties together and acts as a project enabler. References http://www.tem.fi/en/innovations/strategic_centres_and_clusters/innovative_cities_pr ogramme_(inka) https://www.tem.fi/files/40138/temrap_16_2014_web_26052014.pdf https://www.julkari.fi/bitstream/handle/10024/125955/urn_isbn_978-952-00-3575- 4.pdf?sequence=1 http://www.muistiliitto.fi/en/home/national-memory-plan/