A new Health Innovation Hub which has officially opened in Galway is supporting start-ups and expanding businesses in the medical sector.
Minister for Employment and Business Pat Breen and Minister of State for Mental Health and Older People Jim Daly opened the third national Health Innovation Hub at UHG last week.
The HIH is based out of NUI Galway’s Lambe Institute for Translational Research at UHG.
The HIH supports medical start-ups and expanding businesses by working with them and with hospitals and primary care centres at the other end of the chain.
It allows for emerging businesses to have easy collaboration with partners in the health service and works with them at every stage from ideation through to concept development and at the later stage of proof of concept in a clinical environment.
Minister Daly said that this “groundbreaking” enterprise will make it easier for companies to access healthcare experts and bring innovative products to the market.
Health Innovation Hub Ireland was first launched by Simon Harris in 2016. The newly opened hub in Galway is the third after previous hubs at UCC and a second at Trinity College Dublinast year.
In Galway, HIHI works closely with other Enterprise Ireland programmes including BioInnovate Ireland and BioExel at NUIG as well as the university’s Translational Medical Device Lab; CÚRAM, the Science Foundation Ireland Research Centre for Medical Devices, and the HRB Clinical Research Facility.
Professor Martin O’Donnell, principal investigator with the Galway Health Innovation Hub combines expertise from NUIG and the HSE to deliver healthcare projects.
“With a strategic location, embedded in the heart of the hospital, research and teaching, the Hub is a welcome resource to clinicians, researchers and companies,” Prof O’Donnell.
To date, Health Innovation Hub Ireland has engaged with more than 256 companies and 160 healthcare employees to discuss their innovative ideas.
CEO of Saolta University Healthcare Group, Tony Canavan said that this is a “unique partnership” between the health service and enterprise sector.
“Critically, it gives staff working on the front line of the health service an opportunity to bring their ideas and proposals to the Hub that will ultimately improve outcomes for our patients”.
