On 10 and 11 March 2025, Barcelona hosted a key meeting of the TRUSTroke project, funded by the European Union to improve clinical outcomes in stroke with artificial intelligence. The event, held at the Vall d’Hebron Research Institute (VHIR) and Eurecat, included the participation of the Slovenian Jožef Stefan Institute. Its work package, WP3, aims to establish data management principles aligned with standards of trust, ethics and integrity, as well as develop tools that guarantee the transparency and quality of the data used.

During the first day, at the Eurecat offices, work was carried out on the harmonisation of key variables for clinical endpoints (CEPs) and the integration of these data into artificial intelligence models, led by Eurecat, in work package WP4. The next technical steps were discussed and agreements were reached on the treatment of the predictor variables taking into account the clinical vision of Dr. Marta Rubiera, principal investigator of the Stroke Research group of VHIR and neurologist of the Stroke Unit of the Vall d'Hebron University Hospital, and a remote connection with the Italian Policlinico de Gemelli, the coordinating hospital of the clinical study of the WP6 work package.

On the second day, at VHIR, the attendees took a guided tour of the Stroke Unit of the Vall d'Hebron Hospital, where they were able to get to know the work of the Unit's professionals up close and better understand the entire process from the activation of a stroke code until the patient is discharged. Subsequently, in the new research building of VHIR, a harmonization session focused on the monitoring variables and their integration with the Nora Health platform was held. The meeting concluded with the planning of the next steps for the harmonization and development of predictive models in the chronic phase of stroke.

During the same week, an alignment meeting was also held between two other partners of the TRUSTroke consortium, Nora Health and Nacar Design, to discuss design aspects and their technical implications for the mobile monitoring application used in the project, for patients and caregivers.

The partner Nacar Design conducted user experience surveys of several patients and caregivers, with different profiles of involvement in healthcare. This allowed them to propose a series of recommendations that would improve the usability of the App, thus facilitating the clinical monitoring of patients.

This type of meeting strengthens the collaboration between the TRUSTroke project partners and marks a step forward in the creation of a reliable and standardized data ecosystem that allows the design of AI models for improving stroke treatment and improving the experience during home monitoring for greater patient adherence to stroke treatment.

TRUSTroke is funded by the European Union under grant agreement No 101080564. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or of The European Health and Digital Agency (HaDEA). Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.