A group of researchers of CINTESIS – Center for Health Technology and Services Research, and the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Porto (FMUP) have just won a grant of 50 thousand to initiate the internationalization of INSPIRERS – an application that aims to improve patients’ adherence to treatment for respiratory diseases such as asthma.
The fund, granted by the CódigoMais project – an initiative developed to propel the growth of an innovation ecosystem in the health area between Galicia and Northern Portugal –, will facilitate the development and testing of a Spanish version of the app. Besides the possibilities of cooperation among entities from both markets, this initiative will make it possible to assess the performance of INSPIRERS among patients suffering from respiratory pathologies in the Iberian Peninsula.
INSPIRERS was born from a partnership between MEDIDA – a spin-off of the UP –the R&D Unit CINTESIS at FMUP, and the company BloomIdea; and in Portugal, it is also supported by Mundipharma. The app seeks to encourage the patients to follow clinical recommendations and prescribed treatment for their chronic obstructive respiratory diseases, through an interactive game.
“Non-adherence to therapy is currently the big problem regarding these diseases because it increases the risk of aggravation and hospitalization”, explains the researcher João Fonseca, responsible for INSPIRERS, reminding us about the fact that it is estimated that 50% of the patients do not follow the treatment as prescribed.
Sources: FMUP, CINTESIS and MEDIDA