Global competition for the creation and manufacture of products is strong and calls for innovative action. Europeans are showing their prowess in this area by progressing from resource-based manufacturing to knowledge-based manufacturing, as well as from mass produced, single-use goods to new added value, custom-made and sustainable products.

Two European projects developing IT-based services for cross-border healthcare provision, TEN4Health and NetC@rds, have agreed on a common European web service specification supporting standardised messaging to link hospitals and other health care providers with health insurance organisations and with national healthcare IT infrastructure.

The EU-funded SonoDrugs project is developing tiny, image-guided capsules that will convey drug doses through the bloodstream to the site of disease, where they will be activated by ultrasound pulses. The new technology, which focuses on cardiovascular disease (CVD) and cancer, is expected to vastly improve therapeutic efficiency.

The Commission has recently adopted a Communication and proposal for a Council Recommendation with specific actions that Member States can take, either individually, collectively or with the Commission, to improve the safety of patients. Each year, in the EU, between 8% and 12% of patients admitted to hospitals suffer harm from the healthcare they receive, including from healthcare associated infections. Much of that harm is preventable.

During the 12th Annual Scientific Sessions (January 29 to February 1, 2009) of the Society for Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance (SCMR), the world's major international society for cardiovascular imaging, the role of perfusion imaging in clinical decision making will be refined.

Cervical cancer is the second most common cancer worldwide; each year some 60,000 women in Europe alone are diagnosed with the disease, and around half of these cases will prove fatal.Supported by the EU with EUR 2.63 million in funding, the ASSIST project aimed to fix this problem by creating technological links between medical centres specialising in cervical cancer diagnosis and treatment, as well as fuelling data exchange and building a larger data repository.

The European Union launched a new research project targeting to expand the potentials and utility of in-vitro diagnostics through the creation of new standards for the collection, handling and processing of blood, tissue, tumor and other sample materials. Under the 7th Framework Programme, the European Commission approved the initiative's funding and scope to develop corresponding standards, tools and quality assurance schemes.