The Barcelona Medical Photonics Network gathers eight prominent health institutions in Barcelona and their research institutes and ICFO, who coordinates the initiative. The meeting focused on the relationship between photonics and several medical areas and focused on non-invasive brain monitoring in neurocritical care, clinical neurology, and neurosciences. Turgut Durduran, ICREA Professor at ICFO, presented the event, which started with the invited speaker Dr. Antonio Belli, Professor of Trauma Neurosurgery at the University of Birmingham and Director of the NHIR Surgical Reconstruction and Microbiology Research Centre. Dr. Belli discussed sports concussions and traumatic brain injuries.

Postdoctoral researcher Marta Zanoletti helped introduce the speakers of the following sessions, which were then dedicated to showing how photonics can help clinicians in different sectors to assess their treatment and possibly improve their diagnosis.

Dr. Jaume Mesquida, clinician at the Parc Taulí Hospital, gave an overview of the research on critical care patients and how light-based non-invasive devices can help in intensive care units. In critical care, as Dr. Mesquida pointed out, one of the big questions is centred on where doctors need to measure the parameters of the patient to obtain information about their status. As much of the research done in the field has not yet provided the necessary information, there is room for improvement in photonic technologies.