Morning Health Talks in Romania: Urgent Call for Upskilling Healthcare Professionals

Cluj-Napoca, Romania | 15 May 2025 – Innovation needs more than funding. That was the core message of the latest Morning Health Talks event hosted by FreshBlood, EIT Health’s representative in Romania. Held in Cluj-Napoca, this edition brought together key voices from the Romanian healthcare and innovation ecosystem to explore the question: “Beyond funding – what are the essential resources needed to scale innovation in healthcare?”

The event sparked bold conversations, practical insights, and shared solutions, with a spotlight on policy engagement, digital transformation, and clinical trial accessibility.

Catalonia’s Biocat Model: Engaging Policymakers to Strengthen Innovation Ecosystems

Montse Daban, Director of Science Policy and Internationalisation at Biocat (Barcelona), delivered a keynote on how Catalonia built a thriving bioregion by aligning innovation with public policy.

In response to the question, “How do you work with policymakers in a rigid system?”, she described Biocat’s success as a publicly backed non-profit guided by a long-term strategic vision. With sustained government and municipal support, Biocat has helped position Catalonia as a European innovation powerhouse.

In regions with limited public funding – like many across the EIT RIS area – Daban emphasised the importance of public-private alliances backed by EU funds. These must be rooted in stakeholder needs and complemented by

Digital Health in Romania: Bridging the Knowledge Gap

Prof. Dr. Sorana Bolboaca, from the Romanian Society of Medical Informatics, laid the challenges holding back Romania’s digital health transformation: fragmented digital skills among healthcare professionals on the various levels of healthcare, and fragmented databases. These are able only for slow progress. Healthcare professionals need urgent upskilling to use digital solutions. To bridge the knowledge gap, critical needs for knowledge were identified among healthcare professionals: benefits of digital health products and services in healthcare; working effectively with digital health solutions; preventing from potential digital “complications”.

Health Innovation Hub Romania: Breaking Down Barriers in Clinical Trials

Dr. Teodor Blidaru, Leader of Health Innovation Hub Romania, showcased the Hub’s groundbreaking activity on how to bring innovative therapies closer to patients and finally to healthcare. One of the focus areas of the Hub is empowering Clinical Trials in Romania. As in case of digital health, they also encounter a lack of knowledge, additionally misinformation about clinical trials. Educating patients and making healthcare professionals upskilled are crucial tasks. A new information platform (modelled after ‘clinicaltrials.gov’, US, as best practice) is under launch to share knowledge with patients and connect them with trials. The resource limitation is overcome by Public-Private Partnerships (PPP). Shifting perceptions in society and providing innovative therapies for patients are gateways to open mindsets toward innovations in healthcare.

Throughout the event, one shared sentiment echoed among speakers and participants: “Everybody must understand that the challenges are the same, we are not on opposite sides, but on the same side as stakeholders.”