With the aim of showing citizens the work carried out together and seeking sinergies by the Bellvitge Biomedical Research Institute (IDIBELL), the Bellvitge University Hospital, the Catalan Institute of Oncology and the Bellvitge Medicine and Health Sciences Campus of the University of Barcelona, de la Universitat de Barcelona (UB), the four institutions together with the city council of L’Hospitalet, opened their doors the last Saturday november 16 in the first Edition of Sinergia, the festival of research and innovation in health of L’Hospitalet.
IDIBELL facilities in Duran i Reynals Hospital welcomed more than 300 people all the morning, who participated in a programme of activities created by IDIBELL and the city council. Both institutions are working together in the PECT project “L’Hospitalet, an innovative health ecosystem”, co-financed by ERDF European funds, which aims to reinforce Bellvitge as an international reference in the health innovation field and generate new industrial and innovative activity. Along with involving society to achieve a greater impact on health.
In the garden area of the Duran i Reynals Hospital, the SaL’Hut fair brought together the organizations linked to the Bellvitge campus, patient associations – such as the Spanish Association Against Cancer (AECC), the Viladecans Coordinating Association against Cancer or the Catalan Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, among others-, the Blood Bank and the Emergency Medical System. For the youngest ones, the organization set up the Experimenta space, with neuroscience and research workshops by La Mandarina de Newton and the AECC, and with the presence of students from the Bellvitge high school with which IDIBELL carries out an educative tandem, and who exhibited the projects that have been carried out for the last three years, a crossing of arts and science. The Urban Sketchers group of Barcelona also joined the festival, with near 30 sketchers who captured the festive environment of the event on their sketchbooks.
Located on a central space, the Quinaciència! stage offered science monologues given by IDIBELL researchers, a Zumba session organized by the Sports Department of the City council, and a concert of the Crash Manouche combo, of L’Hospitalet Music School-Arts Center.
Another outstanding area will be the one devoted to research innovation: thanks to the Gastronomic Association of L’Hospitalet and Baix Llobregat, attendees were able to taste healthy local food and drinks while talking with researchers.
Guided tours of the laboratories were carried out in a very peculiar way: through a escape room (named IDIESCAPE), designed by Eduscopi. The 120 participants formed research teams that, in almost no time, found the cure that overcome the infection produced by a new and extremely deadly virus. The experience wanted to show the people the day-to-day of researchers, as well as the main challenges they face in achieving their common goal: improving peoples’ health. Before getting out IDIBELL labs, the groups had their pictures taken in front of a new mural graffiti painting by Carlos Almagro and Javi Murillo. The artwork represents IDIBELL’s four research areas: translational medicine, neurosciences, regenerative medicine and cancer.
Marina Rigau, IDIBELL strategy director, Montserrat Figuerola, HUB manager, Tàrsila Ferro, ICO care director, Joan Miquel Nolla, UB Campus Bellvitge vice-dean, and Fran Belver, first deputy mayor of L’Hospitalet city council, gave the welcome speeches of Sinergia, highlighting that thanks to the joint work of all institutions, research and innovation act as synergic agents for health in the nearest future, and that Bellvitge is today already one of the most powerful ecosystems and with more chances of growth in South Europe.
On Thursday 14, within an off-Sinergia session the university students of the Bellvitge Campus enjoyed a series of exclusive activities: guided tours of HUB’s new operating rooms and ICO’s robotic pharmacy, and a dramatized reading of “Obra de Cajal”, inspired by the life and work of Santiago Ramón y Cajal, one of the country’s great scientists and Nobel laureate.The play was was held at the UB Campus Bellvitge.
With the collaboration of:
