On Tuesday, May 28, four representatives of the health sector met at a round table organized by Confidencial Digital with the impetus of Janus Henderson
Last Tuesday, May 28, ECD held an informative breakfast in which it brought together distinguished experts from the healthcare industry at Torre Europa, headquarters of the international manager Janus Henderson Investors, which, thanks to an acceleration in innovation, sees great opportunities in the healthcare sector. . During the meeting they addressed questions such as why it is a trend to invest in this sector, the technological transformation it is experiencing, the impact of Artificial Intelligence and success stories.
The event, organized by Confidencial Digital with the support of Janus Henderson Investors, included the participation of its Sales Director for Iberia, Martina Álvarez; Ana Pérez Domínguez, medical director at Astrazeneca in Spain; Isabel Sánchez Magro, medical director at Merck in Spain; and José Luis Portero, medical director of Abbott Diabetes Care in Spain.
All the guests agreed that we are in a time of great advances in medicine, where technology plays a fundamental role. One of the main conclusions was that collaboration between different actors in the health system and the integration of AI are key to moving forward.
The vision of the future includes more preventive, personalized and accessible medicine, with a health system adapted to new technologies and the needs of the population.
From the investors’ point of view, Martina Alvarez He highlighted that what we are seeing is “a clear acceleration of innovation”, and put some revealing data on the table. If between 2004 and 2008 121 new therapies and medicines were approved, between 2019 and 2023 the figure rose to 243, which represents a growth of more than 100%. In addition, records were broken last year with 73 innovative therapies and medicines compared to the 59 that were approved in 2018. Janus Henderson’s health and biotechnology team, one of the largest specialist teams and responsible for managing more than 12 billion dollars of client assets, acknowledges that they have never seen this pace of innovation before.
“There are more and more blockbuster therapies [tratamientos médicos que logran un éxito significativo en términos de eficacia, impacto en la salud pública y rentabilidad económica]which generate sales of more than a billion dollars, therefore, they reach a broader audience and medicine is more personalized, covering all types of diseases: oncological, genetic, Alzheimer’s, obesity, diabetes, etc.,” commented Álvarez.
One of the great drivers of growth that Álvarez highlighted is the aging of the population. By 2050, one in six people worldwide will be 65 years old or older, an age that typically spends three times more on medical services than younger generations. In this context, Spain is positioned as the second oldest country in the world after Japan.
Janus Henderson points out that, although the health sector in general could benefit from an aging population, some of the greatest opportunities for growth could occur in innovations aimed at age-related diseases (for example, Alzheimer’s, cardiovascular diseases, cancer and orthopedics).
They add that focusing on these growth areas – and the small and medium-sized companies driving innovation within each of them – could help investors make the most of the demographic tailwind in healthcare.
Another growth engine is Artificial Intelligence. Nvidia, the leading provider of AI computing power, says healthcare currently represents only about 1% of its $100 billion data center business. But that number is expected to grow exponentially, with healthcare likely to become the largest vertical in its data center segment within a decade.
The three doctors also stressed the importance of investing in health and citizen well-being and not only in the treatment of diseases, and emphasized the idea of “prevention before cure.”
Isabel Sánchez Magrowho has more than 20 years of experience in the sector and has a degree in General Medicine and Surgery and a doctor of Medicine, noted that: “In the last decade, we have witnessed unprecedented progress in the field of medicine, improving the prevention, diagnosis, treatment and monitoring of diseases as well as the management and quality of health services.”
Examples of this were given and it was noted that “the massive reading and evaluation of data offered by technology through AI allows the diagnosis to be anticipated. This is what preventive and predictive medicine is all about. The risk factors are analyzed and it is possible to know in advance if the person is going to suffer from cancer or another disease.”
Along these lines, Sánchez Magro also mentioned genomic sequencing and molecular diagnostic techniques as “a great revolution” related to preventive factors. “We are able to evaluate and analyze our genome and be able to predict if we are going to suffer from a disease. Through diagnosis with genomics we can diagnose, monitor diseases, detect risk and identify the most appropriate target or therapy in order to apply a personalized treatment.”
Ana Perez Dominguezwho has more than 22 years of experience in the pharmaceutical sector and has a doctorate in medicine and a specialist in clinical microbiology, agrees with Sánchez Magro, but a little more pessimistic: “This is not yet a reality,” she says, referring to the possibility of advancing diagnoses with new technologies.
For her, the key is the coordinated action of all the actors that make up the health system to unify criteria and data, for example, between autonomous communities, and make Spain a more pioneer in clinical research by adapting to new tools.
The health ecosystem around the patient is made up of health professionals, doctors, nursing staff, pharmacists, caregivers, the family, the social worker… “All those roles that did not previously dance together now do so thanks to technology,” which allows that everyone is interconnected.
“Health is no longer in the hospital center, now you can access the best system and best professional without having to travel thanks to telemedicine,” commented Sánchez Magro.
For example, today we can monitor vital signs such as heart rate, blood pressure, and blood oxygen levels through applications and wearables. In some cases, there is the possibility of transmitting this data through applications for monitoring diseases by family members, as well as doctors, who could also receive immediate alerts if any anomalous value is detected.
José Luis Portero Navío, a doctor specialized in internal medicine and bioinformatics, believes in the need to develop hybrid profiles that integrate technology and medicine to drive advances. Both specialties have to go hand in hand. “Machines are very good at answering, but they are not as good as humans at asking questions. AI is the result of natural intelligence, technology is the most human of humans,” says Portero.
The expert believes that AI will empower patients by giving them control of their health data: “The patient will be the owner of their electronic medical record.” It is a tool that facilitates the secure and centralized management of personal health information, allowing you to make informed decisions. It also improves interoperability between systems, offers personalized treatment recommendations, corrects errors and automatically updates information, promoting participation in medical research.
In any case, Portero Navío affirms that clinical decision-making will continue to be the responsibility of doctors, and technology will simply serve as support.
Isabel Sánchez Magro also highlighted that new technologies “have improved efficiency, precision and access to medical care, reducing bureaucracy,” allowing “better use” of health resources and resulting in a benefit for patients with a better quality of the care they receive. “Health technology is helping us to be more human.”
In the last part of the event, the importance of success stories in the health sector was discussed. One of them is gene editing scissors, which allow DNA to be cut and modified in specific places in the genome with great precision.
It is a revolutionary tool used to correct genetic mutations responsible for diseases such as cystic fibrosis and sickle cell anemia, as well as to improve immune therapies against cancer.
Two AI-powered projects were also mentioned. The first is focused on speeding up the diagnosis of heart failure, which is normally detected late. The data analysis offers the degree of probability that the patient has of suffering from this condition. There will be a robot that will call the patient, analyze his voice and depending on how he answers, it will be able to catalog the degree of heart failure. In this way, medical personnel will be freed from a good part of the care burden.
The second is also a robot and is called Lola. It is designed to provide personalized patient monitoring through direct interaction, continuous monitoring of vital signs, and analysis of health data. Lola alerts patients and doctors to any abnormalities, improving treatment adherence and allowing early interventions.
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