Developing tools for personalised medicine is one of LIH’s key objectives. On 1^st and 2^nd June 2016, the European Commission organised a Personalised Medicine Conference in Brussels which was attended or followed via videoconferencing by more than 1000 participants. LIH’s CEO Dr Catherine Larue, invited as speaker, was part of a lively discussion on the challenges for implementing personalised medicine.

The two-day conference explored personalised medicine, the modern concept of patient-tailored therapy, through a research policy lens. The programme was divided into five sessions which brought up the five challenges for the further implementation of personalised medicine that were defined in a white paper named “Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda” by the Coordination & Support Action PerMed in 2015. These challenges are 1) the development of awareness and empowerment, 2) the integration of big data and ICT solutions, 3) the translation of basic to clinical research and beyond, 4) bringing innovation to the market, and 5) shaping sustainable healthcare.

LIH’s CEO Dr Catherine Larue, who actively participates since 2011 in the global Personalised Medicine programme under the European Commission, was invited to give a presentation and to be part of a panel discussion on the drivers and hurdles of getting personalised medicine to the market. With her long-standing experience in the pharmaceutical industry and in her more recent immersion in the public research sector, she confidently dissected the different challenges that currently hinder an accelerated and efficient market entry of personalised therapies and diagnostics. Dr Larue underlined that more communication between stakeholders is necessary to prevent knowledge silos and identify areas of improvement. According to her, public research actors still largely ignore the needs of industry, and industry is mostly unaware of the needs of clinicians. Dr Larue also emphasised on the fact that personalised medicine remains a patient-centred approach, and that this implies the consultancy of patient advocates in the bench-to-bedside process.

‘This conference was not only a great opportunity for me to contribute to high-level dialogs but also to network with representatives of European health research infrastructures like EATRIS and EURORDIS as well as with experts from different research fields such as health economics, rare diseases, cancer and neurosciences’, tells Dr Larue. ‘During our discussions, I highlighted the progresses made in Luxembourg from biomarker discovery to validation platforms,’ she adds.

Besides, the Luxembourg National Research Fund (FNR) was also represented at the conference. Secretary General and Executive Head Dr Marc Schiltz participated in the panel discussion about the translation of basic to clinical research (see photo).