FROM face transplants to robot surgeons, Spain has achieved many medical discoveries and innovations in the last year. 

The country is becoming a world leader in scientific research and last year, it overtook Germany as the European forerunner of clinical trials. 

Spain is proactively investing in research centres, healthcare structure and commercial partnerships, leading to this rise in medical research. 

It is also faster at recruiting research participants and performs more single-country research than most European countries. 

One of the most impressive feats of the year was a pioneering face transplant carried out in Barcelona’s Hospital Universitario de Bellvitge last September. 

It was one of the world’s first to extract tissue from a donor in controlled asystole.

This is a way of manually stopping the heart of a patient with no hope of recovery for the purpose of organ donation, providing an opportunity to retrieve organs that would otherwise be lost after natural death. 

It was the first time in the world this kind of organ retrieval allowed for the extraction of the heart, face, and kidneys.

Now, the hospital is one of only 18 across the globe to have carried out the complex operation, since France achieved the first in 2005. 

The operation lasted 12 hours and included over 60 professionals from at least 10 different medical and surgical departments. 

It was led by Dr. Anna Lopez Ojeda and Dr. Oriol Bermejo alongside Dr. Gabriel Moreno Gonzalez.

The 47-year-old patient was suffering from type 1 neurofibromatosis, a hereditary condition causing benign tumours in the nervous tissue.

He had a large tumour on the side of his face, leading to severe aesthetic, psychological, social and functional issues. 

To remove the tumour, the surgeons had to completely remove his upper lip, nose, right eyelid, the right half of his face and scalp. 

They then implanted the donor’s face, connecting arteries, veins, and nerves. 

The transplanted face will gradually take the shape of the recipient’s face as it adjusts to his bone structure.

It follows a European first carried out last June, where the Hospital Universitario Virgen de las Nieves, in Granada, gave a 16 month old girl an artificial palate.

The palate tissue was designed and generated by a team at the University of Granada, the same group that created artificial skin now authorised by the Spanish Medicines Agency.  

Created over 12 years ago, UGRSKIN has only been used up until now as a last resort, experiential therapy. 

Now burn units can receive specialist training to use the pioneering technology. 

Also in Barcelona, the world’s first emergency robot surgeon was introduced to the Hospital Germans Trias i Pujol in November. 

The robot works 24 hours a day, 365 days a year to attend urgent surgeries.

Known as Da Vinci, the robot will be used alongside surgeons to provide greater accuracy and less trauma for patients. 

So far, it has been a great success, decreasing the time spent in hospital and speeding up recovery. 

“Emergency surgeons are not always experts in certain pathologies, so robotic surgery makes  surgeons who do not have the maximum expertise better,” director of the new emergency surgery unit Jose M Balibrea told La Vanguardia.

Spanish scientists have also been at the forefront of groundbreaking cancer research. 

Javier Cortes, a researcher at the International Breast Cancer Center (IBCC) found a treatment plan to increase survival of early-stage triple-negative breast cancer patients. 

Alongside Queen Mary University London researcher Peter Schmid, he identified that using drugs to boost the immune system increases survival rates if given both before and after chemotherapy. 

Their research was recognised by the New England Journal of Medicine as one of the year’s ‘notable’ studies. 

Meanwhile in Madrid, a research team from the Hospital Infantil Niño Jesus has successfully created an injection to combat tumours in children. 

Known as Celyvir, the treatment has taken its first steps to approval by the Spanish Medicines Agency (AEMPs).

Injected directly into tumours, the medicine activates immune cells to fight against the cancer. 

It is one of three advanced therapies created in Madrid’s health system (SERMAS), alongside Alofisel and NC1. 

Spanish hospitals have also begun to administer the world’s first vaccine against lung cancer. Developed by German company BioNTech, the BNT116 vaccine teaches the immune system to attack lung cancer cells. 

It is now being used at the Hospital Universitari i Politecnic La Fe in Valencia, as well as the Consorcio Hospitalario Provincial de Castellon as part of an international study. 

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer deaths worldwide but this innovation is thought to significantly improve treatment outcomes and minimise side effects compared to traditional chemotherapy. 

It is administered alone or in combination with another drug, cemiplimab. It is hoped that combining the two will lead to better treatment outcomes. 

Overall, 2024 has been a great year for Spanish medical innovation. While clinical trials are dwindling around the world, the country has strengthened its offering, becoming a leader in the medical research industry.

ARTIFICIAL intelligence (AI) is at the forefront of modern medicine, offering solutions to long-standing challenges across diagnostics, treatment, and drug discovery. 

In Spain, this technological revolution is gaining momentum, with several institutions and companies leading the charge.

It comes as no surprise, as Spain has recently become one of the forerunners in global medical research, establishing itself as an international science and technology powerhouse. 

Among Spain’s recents achievements are digital hearts used to quickly and cheaply test new treatments, AI models to develop new medicines and robot counsellors to help patients make important medical decisions. 

Barcelona leads with virtual hearts

Two Barcelona-based organisations, Elem Biotech and the Barcelona Supercomputing Center, have developed a groundbreaking virtual replica of the human heart. 

This model can be personalised for individual patients, enabling precise testing of drugs and treatments.

According to Elem’s co-founder Mariano Vazquez: “Nature can be interpreted using mathematics. In the same way you can do human clinical trials, you can test a cohort of digital hearts.” 

Elem’s supercomputer achieves in just nine hours what would take a human 57 billion years to calculate, offering faster, cheaper, and more sophisticated medical solutions. 

The company’s ultimate ambition is to model the entire human body digitally, opening new possibilities for personalised medicine.

Predicting risk with AI

The Barcelona Supercomputing Centre isn’t stopping at virtual hearts. 

The research centre has developed an AI model capable of predicting stroke risk using data from mobile devices.

This innovation could significantly improve early intervention and prevention strategies, allowing healthcare providers to identify at-risk individuals and offer timely treatment. 

By using the widespread accessibility of mobile technology, this breakthrough represents a major step towards more inclusive and proactive healthcare.

These remote monitoring systems powered by AI allow continuous tracking of patients’ vital signs, enabling timely interventions. 

Chatbots and virtual assistants also help patients manage their symptoms more effectively.

Drug discovery and clinical trials

AI is also transforming drug research with Barcelona-based Biorce recently secured €3.5 million to enhance clinical trials using AI, streamlining processes and increasing efficiency.

Developing new drugs has become notoriously slow and expensive, and rising costs and tighter regulations have slowed development to a crawl. 

AI offers a way to reverse that trend, ensuring life-saving new treatments reach patients faster. Biorce’s AI model ‘Jarvis’ will reduce costs and shorten timeframes for drug development.

It achieves this by helping patients find and understand the requirements for relevant clinical trials, while aiding researchers in the search for eligible participants.

The AI database is a user-friendly solution including over 480,000 clinical trials, streamlining the research process so that effective treatments can be identified sooner. 

AI in healthcare counselling

At a clinical level, AI platforms are being used to provide specialised healthcare guidance through apps like 1Doc3.

The development provides Spanish-speaking users with AI-driven healthcare guidance, allowing millions to make informed medical decisions. 

Powered by AI, the system is able to streamline healthcare by performing basic symptom assessment, triage and pre-diagnosis before connecting the patient to a doctor. 

This enables patients who may not normally have access to a physical clinic get the help they need.

Enhancing diagnostics and imaging

AI-powered algorithms are also revolutionising diagnostics. For example, AI tools match or surpass human experts in analysing medical images like X-rays, CT scans, and MRIs.

These technologies enhance accuracy in detecting conditions such as pneumonia and skin cancers, significantly improving diagnostic efficiency.

Beyond clinical applications, AI is streamlining healthcare administration by managing electronic health records, scheduling, and reducing paperwork, thus taking some of the burden from already stretched healthcare systems.

Ethical and practical challenges

Despite AI’s potential, ethical concerns and regulatory hurdles remain challenging. 

Data privacy, ethical considerations, and the need for robust human oversight are some of the issues researchers are working to overcome. 

Moreover, models like ChatGPT, while promising, are not yet suitable for direct medical use. Researchers at Harvard Medical School and Stanford University highlight significant gaps between AI’s performance in standardised tests and real-world scenarios.

The Assessment and Validation of Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare frameworks (EVIAS) aims to address these issues within Spain, ensuring AI algorithms meet efficacy and safety standards before deployment in clinical practice.

The future of AI in medicine

Combining human expertise and AI will create a healthcare system that is smarter, more efficient, and tailored to individual needs. 

Pioneering initiatives in Barcelona showcase AI’s potential to revolutionise healthcare while addressing critical challenges through frameworks like EVIAS.

As AI technology continues to advance, its influence on medical practice is set to grow, offering innovative solutions to emerging global healthcare issues such as aging populations and resource constraints. 

By streamlining processes and optimising outcomes, AI could help ease the pressures on overstretched healthcare systems worldwide.