The 34th Korea International Medical and Hospital Equipment show held in Seoul last March gathered 1,313 exhibiting companies from 34 countries, including 649 domestic Korean manufacturers over 40,122 sq m of exhibition space. The 4-day  event attracted over 73,000 visitors from 92 countries. About 30,000 items of medical equipment, including high tech devices, medical information systems, rehabilitation equipment and healthcare supplies were presented at the show. Over the years, KIMES has succeeded in establishing itself as the leading technology-oriented and most prominent medical exhibition in the whole of the South East Asian region.
In tune with this year‘s theme ‘Think the Future’, a number of exhibitors, mostly domestic,  were involved in robotic solutions applied to healthcare, showing a variety of robotic medical devices, for example medical sterilization robots, artificial joint orthopedic surgery robots, walking assistance robots as well as robotic rehabilitation systems. There was even a special rehabilitation robot booth in Hall B.
For the third consecutive edition of the show, the Global Bio & Medical Plaza organized by KOTRA (Korea Trade Investment Promotion Agency) provided extra business opportunities for domestic exhibitors by helping to develop commercial and business relationships between foreign and overseas guests and Korean companies.
KIMES is a definite must for international buyers interested in the latest product developments from the particularly dynamic and innovative Korean medical device industry as well as for foreign companies keen to boost their market share in the Korean growing healthcare industry fuelled by increasing consumer demand. KIMES 2019 will take place in Seoul from 14 to 17 March of next year.

KIMESwww.kimes.kr

Hologic, Inc. opened on March 21, 2019 its first Learning and Experience Centre in Zaventem, Belgium (a municipality neighboring Brussels). The state-of-the-art facility provides comprehensive training for customers, healthcare professionals and employees across Hologic’s Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) region, centralizing the education experience for Hologic’s technologies.
Radiologists, lab technicians, obstetrician-gynecologists and many other healthcare professionals count on Hologic solutions to perform when lives are at stake. The 1,500m2 Learning and Experience Centre contains fully equipped training labs with demonstration capabilities for technologies from all four of Hologic’s divisions (Breast & Skeletal Health, Diagnostic, Gynecological Surgical and Medical Aesthetics) to ensure the highest level of understanding and provide hands-on experience.
“The opening of our new Hologic Learning and Experience Centre in Brussels is a significant milestone in our company’s history and reflects our deep commitment to providing unparalleled training and support to our customers,” said Jan Verstreken, Regional President EMEA and Canada at Hologic. “Hologic is a global champion for women’s health and brings leading-edge technology to healthcare systems around the world. The patient is our greatest priority and when their health is in question, nothing is more important to us than providing the most accurate, effective, and timely diagnosis or treatment. As Hologic continues to gain recognition as a leader in women’s health, we commit to supporting the healthcare systems and their patients by ensuring the absolute best use of our truly unique technologies, for the direct benefit of millions of patients in the region.”
For the first time, Hologic will bring training and education for all its products under one roof – located at the heart of Europe – to offer the most cohesive, convenient and interconnected experience. Products featured at the Hologic Learning and Experience Centre include:
3Dimensions™, a mammography system that delivers the fastest, highest resolution 3D™ images and is clinically proven to be more comfortable and enhance workflow; Panther Fusion^®, a fully automated, integrated molecular testing platform with true sample-to-result automation, adaptable workflow options, and a consolidated testing menu; NovaSure®, a minimally invasive, one-time, five-minute endometrial ablation procedure to reduce or stop abnormal uterine bleeding; PicoSure^®, a laser workstation to remove tattoos and revitalize skin by reducing the appearance of wrinkles, acne scars and pigment-like freckles, sunspots and discoloration.
The creation of Hologic’s European hub and the consolidation of key European functions, including customer service, will create up to 60 new jobs in Belgium over the next 12 months. Each year, the new Learning and Experience Centre is expected to welcome several thousand visitors including healthcare professionals, key opinion leaders, current and prospective customers, distributor partners, and employees.

Common beliefs and misconceptions in the community about dementia are still proving obstacles to treatment despite a rise in public awareness campaigns,
Researchers from Flinders University in South Australia pooled the results of 32 dementia surveys from around the world published between 2012 and 2017 and found that public awareness of the causes of dementia has not changed.
Almost half of the total 36,519 respondents had the common misconception that dementia was a normal part of ageing and was not preventable. The importance of formal educational attainment and management of cardiovascular were acknowledged by less than half of respondents even though regular exercise has been proven as the single most powerful influencer of brain health.
The public also tended to endorse poorly supported risk reduction strategies such as taking vitamin supplements, ahead of more effective but time consuming and energetic strategies, such as exercise regimes.
“We were surprised to find that dementia literacy is still so poor, given how much effort has been put into improving understanding,” said lead researcher Monica Cations.
“The view that dementia is a normal part of ageing with few treatment options is a demonstrated barrier to both preventive health behaviours and to help-seeking and diagnosis in the event that symptoms emerge.”
The 32 surveys were sourced from Europe(12), the United States (11), Asia (7) and Australia (2).
The findings and associated problems are outlined in the paper, What does the general public understand about prevention and treatment of dementia? A systematic review of population-based surveys, which has been published by PlosOne.
There are about 47 million people living with dementia worldwide.
While research has not yet discovered a cure, there is accumulating evidence about the potential to prevent approximately one third of cases of dementia with management of risk factors such as poor educational attainment, hypertension, and depression.
The recently adopted World Health Organization (WHO) Global Action Plan on Dementia urges all countries to implement campaigns to raise awareness about dementia. The plan includes a global target that all member countries will have at least one public awareness campaign on dementia by 2025.
http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0196085http://theleadsouthaustralia.com.au/category/industries/health/

In the last few decades, dozens of new breast cancer drugs — from chemotherapies to targeted compounds — have become available for clinical use, and mammogram technology has gone from film to digital. But are the changes making a difference in how many women die of breast cancer?
The answer to that question is a resounding yes, according to a multi-institutional network of researchers who have modelled the effect of breast cancer screening and treatment on mortality rates.
The researchers’ models showed that screening and treatment reduced breast cancer mortality by 49 percent in 2012, compared with 37 percent in 2000.
“These numbers represent very positive news for breast cancer patients,” said Sylvia Plevritis, PhD, professor of radiology and of biomedical data science at the Stanford University School of Medicine and lead author of the paper. “Advances in screening and treatment are saving patients’ lives, and this paper quantifies just how much of a difference these advances are making.”
In 2005, Plevritis and her colleagues in the Cancer Intervention and Surveillance Modeling Network used data from 1975 through 2000 to reveal the relative contributions of screening and treatment to reductions in breast cancer mortality rates. Using knowledge of how breast cancer advances, they developed models representing how many women would die of the cancer with no screening and no treatments, then simulated the effect of screening and treatment on those mortality numbers.  
The decrease in mortality from the modelled baseline, they found, was about 50 percent due to screening and 50 percent due to treatment.
“Now, over 10 years later, a lot has happened in the field,” said Plevritis, who heads the Stanford Center for Cancer Systems Biology. “We’ve moved from film-based mammography to digital; there are new molecularly targeted treatments and new types of chemotherapy regimens. We wondered whether these advances had changed the relative contributions of treatment and screening on breast cancer mortality.”
Advances in screening and treatment are saving patients’ lives, and this paper quantifies just how much of a difference these advances are making.
So researchers in the network updated their models to reflect molecular subtypes of breast cancer. Six independent teams — including researchers from Stanford, the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Erasmus Medical Center, Georgetown University Medical Center, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, the University of Wisconsin, Harvard Medical School and MD Anderson Comprehensive Cancer Center — put together models representing the effect of current treatment and screening.
The group added new data — spanning 2000 to 2012 — to the existing data and compared the conclusions of each model, calculating average effects on mortality of screening and of treatments, including chemotherapy, hormone therapy and the drug trastuzumab, which targets an epidermal growth factor receptor, ERBB2, overexpressed in some tumours. By comparing six models, the researchers were able to replicate the analysis, making the team more confident in results that were seen in all the models. Not only did they look at the effects on breast cancer as a whole, but on molecular subtypes of breast cancer, such as those that are ER positive, meaning that they grow in response to the hormone ostrogen.
“This time around, it was important to look at molecular subtypes because more women are being treated based on the molecular subtype of their tumour,” Plevritis said.
The researchers found that in 2012, screening and treatment together reduced breast cancer mortality by 49 percent. For all breast cancers together, 37 percent of that reduction was due to screening, and 63 percent was due to treatment.
However, when they looked at some molecular subtypes of cancer, the numbers varied. For ER-positive/ERBB2-positive cancer, the most common type and the type for which the greatest number of new targeted treatments are available, only 31 percent of the mortality decline was associated with screening, with 69 percent associated with treatment. For ER-negative/ERBB2-negative cancer, which has fewer treatment options, 48 percent of the mortality decline was associated with screening and 52 percent with treatment, similar to results from 2000.
“Newer drugs, particularly ones that are molecularly targeted, are associated with a greater reduction in breast cancer mortality than screening,” said Jeanne Mandelblatt, MD, MPH, professor of oncology and of medicine at Georgetown University and a senior author of the paper. “However, screening is still having a significant effect in reducing breast cancer deaths.”
In particular, the researchers pointed out, screening can lead to cancer detected at earlier stages and therefore less-intense treatments. Aside from reducing mortality rates, this can translate into fewer side effects and patient co-morbidities.

Stanford Medicinehttps://tinyurl.com/y87wczhd

Scientists have created an artificial intelligence system that could help treat patients with sepsis.
The technology, developed by researchers from Imperial College London, was found to predict the best treatment strategy for patients.
The system ‘learnt’ the best treatment strategy for a patient by analysing the records of about 100,000 hospital patients in intensive care units and every single doctor’s decisions affecting them.
The findings showed the AI system made more reliable treatment decisions than human doctors. The team behind the technology say the tool could be used alongside medical professionals, to help doctors decide the best treatment strategy for patients.
Sepsis, also known as blood poisoning, is a potentially fatal complication of an infection, and kills around 44,000 every year in the UK.
In the study, researchers looked back at US patient records from 130 intensive care units over a 15 year period to explore whether the AI system’s recommendations might have been able to improve patient outcomes, compared with standard care. The researchers now hope to trial the system, called AI Clinician, in intensive care units in the UK.
Dr Aldo Faisal, senior author from the Department of Bioengineering and the Department of Computing at Imperial, said: “Sepsis is one of the biggest killers in the UK – and claims six million lives worldwide – so we desperately need new tools at our disposal to help patients. At Imperial, we believe that AI for Healthcare is the solution. Our new AI system was able to analyse a patient’s data – such as blood pressure and heart rate – and decide the best treatment strategy. We found that when the doctor’s treatment decision matched what the AI system recommended, they had a better chance of survival.”
The team used the AI system to assess which particular treatment approach to sepsis was most successful.
Sepsis can cause a drastic drop in blood pressure which can leave organs deprived of blood flow and oxygen, and can ultimately lead to multiple organ failure and death.
To raise blood pressure and keep the heart pumping, doctors give extra fluids, usually in the form of a salt solution, as well as medication that tightens blood vessels and raises blood pressure, called vasopressors.
Professor Anthony Gordon, senior author from the Department of Surgery & Cancer at Imperial explained: “We know that most patients with sepsis need fluid drips and in more severe cases also need vasopressors to maintain blood pressure and blood flow. There is still much debate amongst clinicians about how much fluid to give and when to start vasopressors. There are clinical guidelines but they provide general advice. The AI Clinician is able to learn what is the best option for each individual patient at that moment in time.”
We’re already making steps to improve diagnosis with our new sepsis tool, but we must also embrace any new technology solutions that can improve patient care and save lives.”
To help doctors decide which approach would boost a patient’s chance of survival, the research team created an AI system that would assess a patient’s vital signs and recommend the best treatment approach.
The system analysed the medical records of 96,000 US patients with sepsis in intensive care units. Using a process called reinforcement learning – where robots learn how to make decisions and solve a problem – the AI Clinician went through each patient’s case and worked out the best strategy of keeping a patient alive. The system calculated 48 variables including age, vital signs and pre-existing conditions.
The system then predicted the best treatment strategy for each patient with sepsis. The results revealed that 98 per cent of the time, the AI system matched or was better than the human doctors’ decision.
The study also found that mortality was lowest in patients where the human doctor’s doses of fluids and vasopressor matched the AI system’s suggestion. However, when the doctor’s decision differed from the AI system, a patient had a reduced chance of survival.
The team say the findings show the AI Clinician could help doctors decide the best treatment strategy for patients.

Imperial College Londonhttps://tinyurl.com/y7bubfbc