Barcelona Health Hub expands its Headquarters: Fundació Sant Pau renovates one of the pavilions of the Recinte Modernista for BHH

Barcelona Health Hub announced yesterday that BHH will expand its headquarters in the near future. This expansion will be possible thanks to the fact that the Fundació Privada Hospital de la Santa Creu i Sant Pau, owner of the Recinte Modernista, will renovate one of the pavilions in the west wing, located just opposite the Sant Manuel Pavilion, the building that currently houses the BHH Headquarters.

The renovation, which will involve an investment of around €10 million, will take 2-3 years and, once the work is completed, BHH will have an additional 2,500 m² at its disposal, giving it a total of 7,500 m² at its headquarters. To continue advancing in this growth, BHH's President Cristian Pascual also made a request to the Administration and the private sector to provide more resources in the field of digital health, in order to contribute to strengthening Barcelona's role as a global benchmark in this field. To attract these resources, Pascual remarked that the digital health sector has a great present and a better future.

As an example, he explained the growth of the BHH association, which since it was created 4 years ago (in 2018), with 3 startups and 10 workers located in a pavilion of the Sant Pau Art Nouveau Site, currently has 60 startups and 500 workers in 3 pavilions and 350 members, including startups, corporations, health institutions, universities and investors, on five continents. This growth has helped position BHH as one of the world's leading digital health hubs. This growth, he said, is happening because digital health is a strategic sector. "We must bear in mind that the pandemic has obviously given a very important boost to the search for technological solutions.

But the future that awaits us, with an increasingly collapsed healthcare system, should make us think that an important way of guaranteeing the sustainability of the healthcare system must necessarily involve the implementation of this type of solution. And we, at Barcelona Health Hub, are here to promote all kinds of alliances so that this innovation and its subsequent transfer to the sector can improve people's quality of life and health and also generate economic activity in the city." Pascual also emphasised that this upward trend in the sector is due to the population's greater concern for a better quality of life.

He recalled that "if a few years ago we only went to the doctor when we felt ill - "sickcare"-, now we also do so to be able to anticipate possible future pathologies and treat them - "healthcare"-. Now we want to live longer and in better conditions. We want to play tennis when we are 80 years old. And this obviously generates a very wide range of possibilities when it comes to innovating and creating valuable products and services." In order to consolidate growth, Pascual recalled the importance of strengthening public-private collaboration. In this regard, he recalled that this summer, BHH and the Hospital de Sant Pau promoted the creation of the Centre for Clinical Validation of Digital Solutions.

The aim of this unit is to evaluate and clinically validate the viability, safety and effectiveness of digital solutions and new healthcare processes; to facilitate the transfer of technology to the healthcare environment; and to promote the adoption of innovative healthcare technologies proposed by companies and public entities in the healthcare sector. The centre is currently studying three digital health solutions.

The first is based on software that optimises the process of adherence to treatment, from medical guidelines to taking medication. The second validates a software that uses artificial intelligence to analyse the state of the coronary arteries through an imaging test.

The third validation studies the capacity of a software to analyse facial gestures using artificial intelligence to predict the degree of work stress and the probability of burnout in professionals. In this context, and to respond to the opportunities and challenges facing the digital health sector, BHH will hold the #BHHSummit: Solving Real Challenges in Healthcare on October 26th at the Recinte Modernista de Sant Pau.

The event will analyse, among other issues, how alliances and partnerships have become the main driver of progress within the various industries related to digital health - from startups to insurance companies, hospitals or pharmaceutical companies.

It will also discuss the need to boost innovation, how to respond to the growing demand for healthcare and the most cutting-edge technologies that are helping to address today's challenges.

The opening session will be given by Jaume Collboni, Deputy Mayor, and Lluís Juncà, Director General of Innovation and Entrepreneurship of the Generalitat de Catalunya.