Isidro Fainé, president of the La Caixa Banking Foundation and full academician of the Royal European Academy of Doctors-Barcelona 1914 (RAED), has signed a collaboration agreement with the managers of the Vall d’Hebron University Hospital in Barcelona that will allow the incorporation to the medical equipment of this reference center of the Siemens Artis Pheno robot. It’s a radiological robot that will be installed for the first time in a digestive endoscopy service and will allow the development of more precise diagnoses.
“The machine has a robotic radiological arc and connected to a scanner that allows real-time images to be generated that overlap the fluoroscopic image to generate a 3D scan in the usual endoscopes”, explained after signing the agreement Josep Ramon Armengol, director of the unit that Artis Pheno will use, in turn created thanks to the impulse of the La Caixa Banking Foundation. During the endoscopy, according to the data provided by this new technology, specialists may specify the sample extraction area or, where appropriate, polyps, stones or foreign bodies. “The precision in this type of treatments is essential both to succeed in polypectomies and not to damage healthy tissues”, added Armengol.
“For more than a century, when Francesc Moragas created the Pension Fund for Old Age and Savings, now La Caixa, the well-being and health of people are part of the essence of the entity. We firmly believe that the commitment to research and attention not only contributes to creating a better society, but also makes it more equitable”, Fainé said. The academician received one year ago the first Forbes prize for Philanthropy for his work at the head of the La Caixa Banking Foundation and its Social Work, institutions that concentrate more than 90% of the assets of all Spanish philanthropic foundations. “In the last decade they have dedicated more than 5,000 million euros to the advancement of Spanish society, covering fields as wide as cultural, educational and scientific”, said the jury of this award.
