The European Partnership for Personalised Medicine (EP PerMed) organised a conference on personalised medicine research on 11 and 12 February 2025 in Berlin, Germany. The conference brought together around 250 international experts in the areas of personalised medicine to present and discuss cutting-edge research and their successful translation into clinical practice.
“With ever-improving biomedical and supporting technologies we now have the opportunity to exploit much more of the excellent results from research and innovation projects. More and more precise treatments are now in our hands for diagnosis, treatment and prevention of diseases,” said Wolfgang Ballensiefen, coordinator of EP PerMed at DLR Projektträger. “As this conference shows, dedicated researchers and innovators are at the forefront of the personalised medicine concept and are changing the way we treat diseases in the present and future”.
The two-day conference combined insights into cutting-edge transnational research from different perspectives such as diagnostics, therapy and clinical trials, and addressed ethical and legal aspects of personalised medicine. It also provided an excellent networking opportunity for top researchers from Europe and beyond to collaborate on future challenges in personalised medicine and prepare for upcoming funding opportunities.
“To take personalised medicine to the next level, cross-border, multidisciplinary and cross-sectoral collaboration is key,” said Ballensiefen. “We all have a common goal here: to advance the field of personalised medicine. We had excellent speakers, presentations and intensive discussions with all conference participants. Patients and society will benefit from the implementation of the personalised medicine approaches discussed in the coming years.
Young Investigator Award and Training on Scientific Integrity
As part of the conference, EP PerMed honoured Eirini Tsirvouli from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology as the winner of the EP PerMed Video Competition for Young Investigators. As part of the ONCOLOGICS consortium, Tsirvouli and her colleagues wanted to move away from a ‘one size fits all’ approach. Based on the unique genotypic and phenotypic characteristics of each tumour, they worked to develop a computational modelling platform to support decision-making in personalised clinical therapy for colorectal cancer.
As satellite events to the conference, EP PerMed is also organising a workshop on scientific integrity in personalised medicine and will host the mid-term seminar for research projects funded under the ERA PerMed Joint Transnational Call 2021.
