When hospitals lag behind smartphones – how can we drive healthcare innovation in our region?

Despite increasing innovation efforts, many healthcare providers in Central, Eastern, and Southern Europe still lack the technical capacity to adopt modern solutions. Fragmented and inaccessible healthcare data, a lack of patient involvement, and outdated regulations are also major bottlenecks for start-ups and researchers. The 2024 Morning Health Talks discussions highlighted key challenges and opportunities shaping the future of healthcare innovation in Central, Eastern, and Southern Europe. Local initiatives in Portugal and Lithuania, show promising paths other countries can follow.

Innovation in healthcare often conjures images of robotics, AI diagnostics, or personalised medicine powered by genomic data. But across Central, Eastern, and Southern Europe, the reality is often far more basic: many hospitals still operate with outdated systems and have little capacity to adopt even existing digital tools. This contrast was perhaps most starkly summarised by Filipa Fixe, Director of KPMG Healthcare in Portugal, who noted, “We currently have more power in our smartphones than hospitals do. This highlights the immense potential of modern technology to revolutionise healthcare if we leverage it effectively.”

The observation was one of the most resonant lessons from last year’s Morning Health Talks, a series of events organised by EIT Health InnoStars across several countries in Central, Eastern and Southern Europe. Throughout the 2024 series, healthcare professionals, start-ups, researchers, public authorities and investors gathered to discuss why innovation in these more progressing region so often stalls—and what can be done to fix it.

The key challenges holding back healthcare innovation
Despite the enthusiasm around innovation, the Morning Health Talks uncovered several persistent and interconnected obstacles. As the 2025 edition approaches, the lessons from last year offer a call to action.

• Lack of technical infrastructure in healthcare providers. One of the most frequently mentioned challenges was the simple lack of basic digital infrastructure in hospitals and clinics. Healthcare institutions may be doing their best with limited resources, but without up-to-date IT systems, there’s no room for integrating new technologies—let alone collaborating with start-ups working on advanced tools like AI diagnostics or digital patient management.
• Fragmented and inaccessible healthcare data. While many countries have centralised digital systems, the data is fragmented, non-standardised, and locked behind bureaucratic processes. Start-ups and researchers often struggle to understand what kind of data exists, who owns it, and how to request access. This creates a situation where breakthroughs are blocked not by a lack of ideas, but by an inability to work with real-world information. As Joana Carrilho from Porto University explained, “Technology solutions need to be based on real-world challenges and be user-friendly to ensure adherence. This guarantees that innovations are practical and widely accepted by users.”
• Outdated regulations. Across the region, many healthcare systems still operate under outdated regulations that were not designed for a digital or innovation-driven era. New technologies—from AI diagnostics to remote monitoring—often fall into legal grey zones. And in countries where governments change frequently, meaningful reform is difficult to maintain.
• Conservative mindsets and missing knowledge. Healthcare institutions often resist change. There is also a lack of awareness among policymakers about how essential digital health solutions are becoming. Innovators can change this by formulating more positive messages. As Ana Correia de Barros from Fraunhofer Portugal put it, “What if we associated open innovation not just with novelty or disruption, but also with mending
• Low patient involvement. Innovation is not just about technology—it’s about people. Yet patients, who are the ultimate end users, are often not involved in testing or shaping those solutions. As Dr. Suja Somanadhan from University College Dublin pointed out: “Patients must be at the center of all healthcare initiatives. Their experiences and needs should drive innovation.”

Learning from success: what can be done?
While challenges abound, the Morning Health Talks also showcased concrete examples of progress that other countries can emulate across the EIT Regional Innovation Scheme (RIS) countries .

Portugal – Porto’s municipality-led innovation model
In Portugal, the city of Porto has pioneered a service-based innovation ecosystem led by its municipality. Instead of funding start-ups directly, the city supports them through existing incubators, organises “first buyer” events where public institutions can test new solutions, and even mobilises citizens to help identify unmet needs in healthcare. By integrating citizens into the innovation cycle, Porto has created an ecosystem of over 800 start-ups and scale-ups and made itself a national hub for health R&D.

Elsewhere in Lithuania, the datapilot.lt project, launched in 2023 by the EIT Health Hub in Kaunas, is testing practical solutions for healthcare data sharing by linking start-ups with hospitals, legal experts, and national data authorities. The project helps selected start-ups navigate data access challenges while ensuring compliance with laws, and aims to develop a repeatable model for smoother data sharing.

Collaboration is the only way forward
As the 2025 edition of Morning Health Talks approaches, the message is clear: collaboration is not a nice-to-have—it is the only way forward. ”Healthcare innovation is too complex, too cross-cutting, and too urgent to be tackled in silos. No single hospital, start-up, ministry, or research institute can solve the region’s healthcare challenges alone”, said Monika Toth, EIT Health InnoStars RIS Director “From integrating fragmented data systems to updating regulations or engaging patients meaningfully in the innovation process, progress only happens when the ecosystem works together. Morning Health Talks facilitates this. It is more than an event—it is a mechanism for aligning actors who may never otherwise have crossed paths.”