SensUs at:
Pulse 2016

"Going from Lab to Life" was the slogan of the Puls Event on 18 February 2016, a national event by the Dutch Heart Foundation and the Heart & Vascular Patient Group, with the purpose of enhancing patient participation in scientific research. In the age of mass communication and automization, the voice of consumers is often not taken into account, and healthcare is no different. During the Puls Event patients, researchers, companies and medical professionals were all actively discussing the future course of healthcare in the field of cardiovascular disease. 

The SensUs organisation was invited to organize and lead one of the workshops at the Puls Event. In this workshop patients, researchers, companies and medical professionals could give their opinion about biosensing. In small groups several questions were discussed such as "Can a patient perform a diagnostic test on his/her own body for the first time?" and "Would patients like to wear a biosensor implant?", which evoked many lively responses.

Among those were remarks such as "I wouldn't know what to do with all those numbers or if the test would show a worrisome result", "I know many heart failure patients who are afraid of potential disease exacerbations and who would love to be carefully monitored" and, much to the surprise of some researchers, "I would love an implant so that I don't have to think about having to test myself every several hours". All in all a very fruitful discussion with many valid points throughout the entire workshop. 

The results from the workshop will aid us in developing a multi-year roadmap for the SensUs competition. With SensUs, just like Puls, we hope to stimulate and facilitate the involvement of patients and the general public in healthcare developments. We therefore hope to continue our collaboration with the Puls Event in the coming years.