Sixth EURORDIS Summer School continues to empower participants
The sixth EURORDIS Summer School was held in Barcelona on 17-21 June 2013, bringing together another group of enthusiastic participants to learn about the medicines development process from clinical trials through marketing authorisation. This year’s Summer School brings the total trained to nearly 200 participants, representing 34 different countries and 72 different diseases.
Training through the Summer School empowers alumni to become further involved in activities at the European and local levels. These activities include review of applications for orphan designation and advanced therapy classification in scientific committees at the European Medicines Agency (EMA) as well as review of documents destined for the public and participation in scientific advice (protocol assistance). At the local level, 5 of the ten EURORDIS-EUROPLAN advisors have attended the Summer School.
Continued support and on-going training is provided to Summer School Alumni through online learning resources on the EURORDIS website and video recordings of previous Summer School presentations. Alumni can also keep in touch with each other and expand their networks through EURORDIS social media links, subscription to the newsletter, and a monthly therapeutic report on activities at the EMA. In addition, alumni can set up or join a RareConnect.org community, accessing the database to find other patients trained in their country or disease area.
Further capacity-building has been offered via attendance at the DIA Euromeetings where 55 Summer School alumni have received one of the 180 patients’ fellowships offered since 2008.
For more information, contact Nancy Hamilton (nancy.hamilton@eurordis.org)
Louise Taylor, Communications and Development Writer, EURORDIS