The EU supports research and innovation activities through a range of programmes, including the Seventh Framework Programme for Research (FP7), the Competitiveness and Innovation Programme (CIP) and Structural Funds. Now the European Commission is developing a guide to help researchers select the right programme for their activities and even combine funds from different sources.

The objective of the Drug Check project is to validate an on-line, pan-European service, which gathers, organises, stores, makes available and presents information and data covering pharmaceuticals and their interactions.

Clothes, bed sheets and home appliances could soon help heart patients to better deal with their condition. The new EU-funded HeartCycle project sets out to create innovative telemonitoring solutions. Launched on 1 March, it is one of the largest biomedical and healthcare research projects in the EU.

Health-e-Child (HeC) is working to produce a universal biomedical knowledge repository and communication conduit for the future, a common vehicle by which all clinicians will access, analyse, evaluate, enhance and exchange biomedical data of all forms.

The new IT systems in the NHS are on course to deliver better care and an estimated £1.14 billion in savings by 2014, according to the first annual Benefits Statement published by the Government. It shows that since its introduction, the National Programme for IT has already delivered a total of £208 million in savings by providing quicker, more efficient and convenient patient care.

The ePractice.eu portal hosts an array of exciting communities which gather members with common interests, offering messaging, blogging, calendar and document sharing tools as well as networking opportunities. Communities are open and help ePractice.eu users to connect even better with other peers to share knowledge and news. Any ePractice.eu registered member can start a community or voluntarily join one.

Large numbers of unnecessary deaths and avoidable medical complications in intensive care units (ICU) are attributable to the difficulties of treating high glucose levels in critically ill patients' blood. That is about to change for the better thanks to a new automated insulin delivery system developed by European researchers.