Under the patronage of Chairperson of Dubai Healthcare City Authority (DHCA) HRH Princess Haya Bint Al Hussein, wife of HH Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, the Disruptive Innovation in Healthcare Conference, organised by Mediclinic Middle East in collaboration with Mohammed Bin Rashid University of Medicine and Health Sciences (MBRU), took place yesterday, September 18^th.

The conference was held in MBRU in Dubai Healthcare City, and saw the attendance of more than 200 healthcare professionals, senior managers, regulators, academicians, insurers and physicians from across the UAE’s healthcare sector. Following an introductory address by Professor Ian Greer, President and Vice Chancellor of Queen’s University Belfast, MBRU’s academic partner, who spoke about innovation in academic medicine, the conference heard from an impressive line-up of distinguished speakers from the UAE and across the globe, and provided an unparalleled platform to discuss the vast ranges of innovation in healthcare.

Amongst the panelists, His Excellency Khalfan Belhoul, Chief Executive Officer of Dubai Future Foundation was present and Dr.  Mohammad Al Redha, Director of The Executive Office for Organizational Transformation, Dubai Health Authority who chaired the first session. The second and third sessions were chaired by MBRU’s Dean of the College of Medicine Professor Alawi Alsheikh-Ali as well as MBRU’s Associate Dean for Innovation and the Future, Professor Homero Rivas, consecutively.

Among the conference faculty were Paul Bessems, Chief Executive Officer, Weconet Technologies on the subject of Blockchain; Dr Niti Pall, Medical Director to the Global Health Practice, KPMG Center for Universal Health Coverage, who discussed the redesign of incentives; Dr Amjad Zaim, Chief Executive Officer, Cognitro Analytics, who tackled the issue of artificial intelligence in healthcare; Krishna G V. Giri, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Dhiyah Consulting, on the use of cutting edge technologies such as virtual reality in healthcare;; Dr Joel Diamond, Chief Medical Officer and Co-Founder, 2bPrecise, who talked about precision medicine; Anna-Lisa Silvestre, Patient Engagement Consultant, who presented on how to engage patients in a digital world; and Trip Allport, Managing Director, Africa Resource Centre, who revealed how simple, not complicated, innovation solutions could help resolve long standing health access problems in Africa.

David Hadley, CEO, Mediclinic Middle East, said: “It is our great privilege to work with DHCA and MBRU on this valuable conference, and to highlight the significant impact of disruptive innovation on our healthcare system.  At Mediclinic, we are constantly striving to deliver the safest and most accurate healthcare to our patients.  In order to achieve this it is important that we, and everybody else involved in healthcare, understands how technological innovation is revolutionising the way we provide our services, embraces it and makes it a reality.  Examples of this in practice are the recent first implementations of Mediclinic’s new state-of-the-art electronic health record which will streamline care processes, eliminate duplicate tests, expedite billing and result in a greatly enhanced patient journey.  It will also give us the ability to adopt new digital technologies in the future and to remain at the forefront of an ever-changing healthcare environment.”

Dr. Amer Sharif, CEO of DHCA’s Education Sector and Vice Chancellor of MBRU said: “We are delighted to hold the Disruptive Innovation in Healthcare Conference in collaboration with our clinical academic affiliates Mediclinic Middle East. At MBRU, our vision is to become a global hub for innovative and integrated healthcare education and research at the service of humanity. We believe that hosting such conferences go in parallel with our vision; we empower our medical students to learn about how innovation and medicine are interlinked through a number of courses. The UAE at large and the city of Dubai are known to be international platforms for innovative ideas in several areas, especially healthcare. We’re happy to welcome a number of local and internationally renowned speakers to MBRU today to discuss and explore the topics of artificial intelligence, precision medicine, Blockchain, and much more. We’re also thankful to DHCA’s visionary Leadership for their immense support to innovation.”

The conference has been accredited by the European Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (EACCME®) with 6 European CME credits and locally by Dubai Healthcare City Regulatory for 6 CPD points.