The XXII Conference of the Italian Association of Clinical Engineers has begun in Riccione (Aiic), which will continue until June 15 on the theme ‘Beyond the NRP: towards a technological culture in support of health‘. Four days, three of meetings and debates and one of training courses, on new technologies and modernization of the technology park. The intervention of Umberto Nocco, president of Aiicwhich recalled the almost thirty years of life of the association founded in 1993: “Three decades in which clinical engineers have transformed and have increased in quantity, diffusion, skills, responsibility, quality of presence throughout the territory and ‘within all areas of health. We were a few hundred’ skilled workers’ in a healthcare that was looking for its future, while today we are a professional, scientific and associative reality that dialogues with all institutions, which is present in all junctions decision-making by the National Health Service, procurement, maintenance, safety “.
Aiic was then given the license plate of American College of Clinical Engineering (Acce) award for Italian clinical engineering, attributed in 2021, but not delivered due to pandemic. The award was brought to Italy by Binseng Wang, one of the founders and past-president of Acce, and received by Lorenzo Leogrande, past-president Aiicfor “the work of development and institutional positioning of clinical engineering in Italy”, an action that can be considered as a model for other professional associations throughout the world.
Today health care roots its most advanced services in the field of technologies, experts point out. “It is impossible to imagine advanced and quality healthcare without technology – Nocco explained – what would an intensive care or an operating room be without the dozens of tools and interconnected that allow health professionals to operate and patients to survive. What would research be without technological development? What would hospitals be? What would even the simple office of a general practitioner be? Healthcare technologies are not a healthcare commodity, but one of its cornerstones. And who uses, acquires, governs the technologies, with whom must they relate for a correct management of the same, if not with the clinical engineers who are the professionals who completely cover this delicate area? “.
The importance of technology therefore draws attention to the National Recovery and Resilience Plan, a historic opportunity for our country, remark the clinical engineers. President Aiic observed that in the last 20 years healthcare has been almost a ‘portfolio’ to draw on, causing imbalances and disservices that have affected especially the less organized areas of the country, while today it seems that something has changed in the plans of health policy and of legislators. “The PNRR has made unthinkable funds available – continued Nocco – over 15 billion euros and more than 6 thousand projects to start. As professionals at the forefront of this sector, we see this push towards renewal positively, but we know that it is not enough to buy or renew. technologies to produce effective and useful modifications, as also the period of the first pandemic wave has taught us “.
“We do not need individual interventions – he warned – but of a common ‘technological culture’ for managers, health professionals, politicians, institutions for regional and national decision-makers. To initiate and root this technological culture we must meet here and after all the stakeholders, to create the foundations for a new strategic, organizational and professional phase for the NHS. “
Aiic’s priority objectives are therefore “continuous dialogue with stakeholders, internal discussions within the profession, listening to the voice of other professions and citizens, the centrality of training and the space of great attention to young professionals who try to understand how to enter the world of work in the best possible way “.