Established in 1991, Harokopio University of Athens (HUA) is a public University located in the city of Athens, dedicated to promoting high-quality education and research in a small, well focused set of intellectual areas. HUA has been highly ranked based on its performance with regard to citations per Professor/Researcher and thus it is greatly acknowledged as a rapidly developing and expanding University in Europe.
The Department of Nutrition & Dietetics (DND) within the School of Health Science & Education at HUA offers high standard graduate and postgraduate education, covering all aspects of human nutrition and clinical nutrition science. Research activity is highly encouraged by the School, promoting scientific knowledge primarily focused in the area of Non-Communicable Diseases prevention and management. Within the DND, Prof. Yannis Manios is leading the “Nutritional Assessment, Health Promotion and Counselling” group, one of the most active and recognised research groups of the University. This group has experience in studying the interactions among behavioural, demographic and physiological indices leading to the development of NCDs, as well as developing and implementing interventions for their prevention.
The Department of Informatics and Telematics within the School of Digital Technology at HUA has a mission to advance Computer Science, primarily in the field of web/telematic applications, big data, machine learning and networking. The Department places strong emphasis on application domains such as internet technologies, digital transformation, e-business, e-government, e-health, advanced transport telematics, etc. Within the DIT, Christos Diou, Assistant Professor, leads the group that will join MELIORA. The group consists of PhD students and researchers on Artificial Intelligence and especially Machine Learning, including methods for objective behaviour monitoring and observational data analysis.

The Department of Nutrition and Dietetics, School of Health Science and Education, coordinates the project and will ensure a successful completion of the project goals on time, within budget and quality standards. This department will also ensure compliance with the “ethics requirements” of the project and run the Greek study focusing on healthy mothers at risk of developing breast cancer, from both urban and rural areas. The Department of Informatics and Telematics, School of Digital Technology will participate as a technical partner developing the Causal Recommendation Engine.

manios@hua.gr

ekaragl@hua.gr

cdiou@hua.gr

agavrieli@hua.gr

Karolinska Institute (KI), founded in 1810, is Sweden’s only university, especially focusing on biomedical sciences. In addition, KI awards the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine annually. KI ranks as one of the world’s leading medical universities, thanks in part to the quality of its research activities, which today account for 40% of all medical research in Sweden. Some 80% of KI’s income is devoted to research, distributed among some 600 research groups covering all medical fields. Department of Biosciences and Nutrition, IMPACT research group has extensive experience in applied nutrition, physical activity, and obesity research, with 20 years of experience in data collection of physical activity and nutritional/dietary behaviours at different ages, mostly focusing on children and adolescents. Ioannis Ioakeimidis’ Research Unit has strong expertise in lifestyle, dietary, and physical habit analysis, on real-life behavioural modelling and behavioural change research. His group has EU-project experience spanning from end-user system requirement analysis and design to the coordination and realization of children and adolescent data collection with an emphasis on school-based actions and interventions.

KI’s role is pivotal in designing and continually adapting the Living Labs of PREVENT used for research and piloting. This includes selecting members, defining health-related indicators, addressing ethical concerns, establishing data collection methods, and monitoring procedures. KI also contributes to crafting active engagement strategies aimed at multiple stakeholders, encompassing schools, local communities, families, peers, and the public. Additionally, KI facilitates workshops involving various stakeholders to assess and refine these strategies, ensuring their effectiveness.

vasileios.papapanagiotou@ki.se

INCLIVA is a biomedical research institute based in Valencia (Spain) managing the research undertaken by the Hospital Clínico Universitario de Valencia (HCUV), the Faculty of Medicine of the Universitat de València and the Carlos Simón Foundation.
The HCUV offers healthcare to ≈350.000 inhabitants in the region of Valencia, and its Oncology department includes a dedicated BC Group that oversees nearly 500 new patients yearly. The hospital treats and follow-up patients for 5 years, including long adjuvant treatment with aromatase inhibitors. Specialised doctors routinely collaborate in the long-term management of BC patients, also leading to a strong joint research history.
Moreover, INCLIVA premises include Phase I–III clinical trials facilities and a specific out-patients clinic, laboratories and a biobank, with staff composed by experienced specialists in clinical studies and collaborative projects.
INCLIVA belongs to the Worldwide Innovative Networking (WIN) Consortium in personalised cancer medicine, with more than 200 active clinical trials in the domain of oncology.

INCLIVA serves as the Clinical Coordinator (CC) for MELIORA’s virtual coach interventions (VCI). This entails collaborating on the Spanish situation analysis, spearheading the development of country profiles and adaptation strategies, and implementing MELIORA VCI in the Spanish cohort, in partnership with FISABIO, with a specific focus on breast cancer patients and survivors. Additionally, INCLIVA will provide support for evaluating and scaling up the interventions to other centres. Furthermore, it will actively engage stakeholders and contribute to all communication and dissemination activities stemming from its participation in the project.

chernando@incliva.es

amiralles@incliva.es

The Lithuanian University of Health Sciences (LSMU) is a state university higher education institution with rights of a legal entity and operating as a public institution. It was established in 2010 by way of merger of Kaunas University of Medicine and the Lithuanian Veterinary Academy during the reorganisation. The origins of the University lie in the establishment of Higher Medical Courses in Kaunas in 1919, on the basis of which the Faculty of Medicine was established with the Veterinary Department within its structure after the establishment of the University of Lithuania in 1922. Today, LSMU is the largest and most unique university higher education institution in Lithuania, bringing together natural sciences, medicine and health, and agricultural sciences. It follows the principles of unity of science, studies, human and animal health care, academic freedom, and the autonomy of the University in its activities. LSMU’s mission is to create, accumulate, systematise, and disseminate scientific knowledge, the latest achievements in research and education, to teach and educate creative, honest, enterprising, educated, healthy, independent, and entrepreneurial personalities, to foster democracy and prosperity, and to nurture a healthy and well-educated society.

LSMU is one of four clinical sites in which the MELIORA VC intervention study will be conducted. LSMU will run the Lithuanian randomised control trial, which involves breast cancer patients, survivors, and healthy individuals at risk, to evaluate the effect of the intervention on temporal changes in behaviours (nutrition, physical activity, alcohol consumption). In the study participants’ recruitment process, LSMU collaborates with POLA LT, the largest patient organisation in Lithuania. LSMU is also responsible for the development of the content of the intervention and strategies for its effective implementation for healthy individuals.

gintare.kaliniene@lsmu.lt

The breast cancer society Amazona was founded in 1978 and is the oldest local association in Sweden, operating in the Stockholm region. It is one of 33 local breast cancer societies, which are all part of the umbrella organisation The Swedish Breast Cancer Association. Amazona is a non-discriminative, non-profit, non-political and non-religious organisation. Most of Amazona’s activities are run by approximately 80 volunteers and 5 employees, most of whom are breast cancer survivors themselves. The organisation’s main purpose is to support those who suffer from breast cancer as well as their close relatives, and to spread knowledge about breast cancer and the importance of an early diagnosis, without giving medical advice. Other purposes of Amazona are to work for improvements in cancer treatment through communication and information exchange with health care professionals and policy makers and to educate health care and research personnel on the experience and point of view of BC patients.

Amazona will provide the patient perspective in several tasks of the project and collaborate with KI in the Swedish intervention study, by engaging breast cancer survivors and organising in-person or online consultations/workshops for the study participants in the Stockholm area.

linda.engstrom@amazona.se

The Foundation for the Promotion of Health and Biomedical Research of Valencia Region, FISABIO, is a non profit scientific and healthcare entity, whose primary purpose is to encourage, to promote and to develop scientific and technical health and biomedical research in Valencia Region. FISABIO integrates and manages the Health Research Map of the Centre for Public Health Research, Dr. Peset University Hospital Foundation, Alicante University General Hospital Foundation and the Elche University General Hospital Foundation. In addition, FISABIO assumes the scientific activity of other 18 Health Departments.
FISABIO provides service to more than 1,500 healthcare professionals within the Valencia network, who are specialists working in research projects and clinical trials managed by the Foundation.Fisabio’s Cancer and Public Health research unit is specifically focused on cancer prevention research and it is specialised in introducing equity perspective as a transversal issue. This research unit works closely with public health managers of the cancer screening programmes of the Valencia region.

Fisabio’s main role in the project is to implement MELIORA’s virtual coach interventions in healthy women at risk of developing breast cancer in Valencia region (Spain). Fisabio will also support the stakeholder engagement and situation analysis, the development of materials for rolling out the MELIORA virtual coach intervention, the creation of tools for evaluation, and the establishment of a European Stakeholder and Policy Advisory Board.

ana.molina@fisabio.es

marina.pinto@fisabio.es

POLA is the largest patient organisation in Lithuania providing dedicated social services for its community members, acting as a patient advocate and contributing to the development of health care and social policy systems both at national and EU level. POLA covers all cancers, is an umbrella of 30 NGO‘s and unites a community of 46 thousand cancer patients – POLA cardholders, bringing together cancer patients, who applied for POLA card membership and are registered in the POLA database. The Association’s mission is to make all possible efforts to improve the quality of life of cancer patients and their families. POLA aims to ensure that both patients and their families have access to effective treatment and would receive the best possible informative, social, psychological, and mental support.

POLA will support the Lithuanian randomised controlled trial by engaging breast cancer survivors and patient participants. POLA will be also running in-person or online consultations/workshops for the study participants.

neringa@pola.lt

SWPS University is a leading higher education institution in Poland with a strong research profile in the field of behavioural sciences, and has established research centres dedicated to social psychology, clinical psychology, developmental psychology, cognitive neuroscience, and sociology. The University was established in 1996 and now, after more than twenty years of a dynamic growth, we are proud to be a strong community with campuses in 6 Polish cities, including Warsaw, Wroclaw, Sopot, Poznan, Cracow and Katowice, over 14,500 students (1,100 international) enrolled in 35 undergraduate, graduate and doctoral programs.

The European Food Information Council (EUFIC) is a consumer-oriented non-profit organisation that promotes public health by making the science behind food and health more accessible and easier to understand among the public. EUFIC’s mission is to provide science-based information that inspires, empowers and facilitates healthier and more sustainable diets and lifestyles among European citizens.

SWPS takes the helm in synthesising current research to elucidate optimal intervention strategies for fostering a healthy lifestyle. Our focus extends to identifying behaviour change techniques and intervention delivery strategies tailored to the needs of women at risk for breast cancer, breast cancer patients, and survivors alike. Collaborating with stakeholders from four countries, SWPS will delve into understanding the local context to pinpoint barriers and facilitators. Through this collaborative effort, we strive to co-create and implement the most effective strategies for MELIORA Virtual Coach Interventions (VCI).

aluszczynska@swps.edu.pl

egoncalves@swps.edu.pl

The European Food Information Council (EUFIC) is a consumer-oriented non-profit organisation that promotes public health by making the science behind food and health more accessible and easier to understand among the public. EUFIC’s mission is to provide science-based information that inspires, empowers and facilitates healthier and more sustainable diets and lifestyles among European citizens.

EUFIC will be responsible for developing the tools to plan for the impact evaluation of the MELIORA Virtual Coach Intervention, as well as for creating content which will be used during the interventions as well as the communication campaigns which will be part of the interventions targeting the studies participants. EUFIC will also support MELIORA’s communication and dissemination activities through its broad network.

nina.mcgrath@eufic.org

katerina.palasha@eufic.org

PredictBy is an innovative research and consulting company that provides public and private organisations with reliable, independent, and robust advice regarding the implementation of effective strategies and policies. We identify and capture societal challenges related to health, environment, and digital transformation, turning scientific methods into actionable knowledge. PredictBy operates in the field of Behavioural Science, Data Science and Regulation, and is committed to helping organisations to make better decisions.

PredictBy is actively leading and contributing to various tasks within the MELIORA project. Through situation analysis and collaborative workshops, PredictBy aims to gain a comprehensive understanding of relevant contextual factors relating to breast cancer care to guide the adaptation and successful implementation of the MELIORA VCI. Additionally, PredictBy will be developing tools for the evaluation of the interventions, encompassing the development of methods for process, impact, cost-effectiveness, and scalability assessment.PredictBy will also be in charge of leading MELIORA VCI’s cost-effectiveness and budget impact assessments. Lastly, PredictBy will play a supportive role in other various tasks, ensuring complementation and cooperation among different tasks of the project.

ffolkvord@predictby.com

CERTH is one of the largest research centres in Greece having received numerous awards and distinctions such as the European Descartes Prize, a European Research Council Advanced Grant and a Microsoft International Contest Prize.
CERTH has important scientific and technological achievements in many areas including: Energy, Environment, Industry, Mechatronics, ICT, Transportation & Sustainable Mobility, Health, Agro-biotechnology, Smart farming, Safety & Security, through five research institutes, each focusing on one or more of the aforementioned fields of research. Out of those, CERTH participates in MELIORA through the Information Technologies Institute (ITI) and the Multimedia Knowledge and Social Media Analytics laboratory (MKLab) with significant experience and scientific expertise on the development of novel machine learning and deep learning approaches, and their use in applications such as multimedia content understanding and social media analysis.

CERTH is leading the technical activities of MELIORA towards the development of Information Technology tools that will help in the behavioural change interventions planned.

ikom@iti.gr

EXUS designs, creates and markets software solutions and services in several areas, such as business, e-health, e-learning, business process management, collections, and wireless applications. The company operates its internal AI Labs department, which is currently leading a number of EU-funded R&D projects, offering AI solutions across fields.

EXUS is a technical partner in MELIORA developing the Visual Interpretability and Explainability AI component of the Virtual Coach. EXUS will also be responsible for the system’s requirements and architecture in collaboration with CERTH.

m.panniello@exus.ai

RISA Sicherheitsanalysen GmbH (RISA Safety Analysis Ltd) – an SME- is a leading vendor of large IT platform solutions. It was founded in 1990 from a research group at the Technical University of Berlin. Since then the initial field of activities has expanded from probabilistic safety, risk and reliability analysis, mainly for nuclear energy plants, to complex information system applications and platforms for decision analysis/support, optimisation and data analysis, including Big Data and IoT, for various other industries and engineering offices (including the railway, automotive and aviation transportation industries), as well as government agencies (including the German Ministry of the Environment).
RISA offers its clients full service including complete system analysis with the necessary software, special software adaptation, mathematical and statistical methods development and supply and installation of the accompanying hardware and software. The company has been a partner in various EC funded projects on interoperable platforms for situation awareness, behavioural change and decision support on multidisciplinary sectors, while also serving as the system integrator in several projects.
Moreover, RISA has been the coordinator of Eco-Bot, an EU funded project aiming to engage customers towards more energy efficiency behaviour through the implementation of a chatbot that exploits multi-factorial behavioural modelling and provides personalised energy efficiency advice; Currently, RISA is participating in the PREVENT project, developing an innovative AI educational health-bot.

RISA’s vision is to transfer its expertise to adjacent domains that can benefit from its experience in addressing large-scale and complex data management problems. In the MELIORA project, RISA will serve as the Technical Integration Manager (TIM) for the MELIORA Virtual Coach. Applying its expertise in technical integration, RISA will take charge of organising data collection and integration procedures essential for the successful implementation of Virtual Coach interventions.

s.camarinopoulos@risa.de

The European Health Management Association (EHMA) is a Belgium-based non-profit membership organisation that focuses on enhancing the capacity and capability of health management to deliver high-quality healthcare. EHMA’s vision is to support the spread of knowledge on excellence in health management at all levels: systemic, organisational and individual. EHMA operates at an international, European and national level, with a membership of over 50 organisations and 30+ individuals and a broader network with over 1,000 key stakeholders ranging from managers, educators, professionals and more. EHMA’s activities revolve around three key workstreams: (i) membership-focused actions and network engagement, (ii)research and EU project work , and (iii) events and workshops, such as EHMA Annual Conference and the Yearly Programme Directors’ Group Meeting.

EHMA leads project communication and dissemination efforts, boosting awareness of the project and its network to amplify research visibility. We will aid in transferring MELIORA’s technology to market actors for future solutions. Through workshops involving diverse stakeholders, EHMA will gather data while also analysing the scalability and transfer potential of the MELIORA AI virtual coach. Additionally, we will establish a European Stakeholder and Policy Advisory Board, advising prevention programs internationally for replicating and scaling the project’s successes in cancer prevention plans.

giuseppe.martone@ehma.org

BioAssist S.A. is an SME that provides innovative commercial services in the fields of mHealth, assistive technologies and homecare. Focusing on developing innovative solutions to ensure the senior population’s life quality, extending and assisting their independent living, BioAssist delivers superior monitoring and communication services through timely response and accurate recording of vital signs and other critical information, serving the constantly changing needs of the health-centric communication services. Via its services, BioAssist enhances compliance of the elderly population to their self-care commitments, providing peace-of-mind to them and their families, while remaining minor intrusive and offering an excellent user experience. The core team consists of researchers, engineers and data scientists with extended research activity in the field of telemedicine and substantial expertise in the development of e-health applications and wireless medical sensor networks.

BioAssist will lead the processes for implementation of the MELIORA Mobile and Web Applications. These components will act as the endpoints of the system to the participants involved in the studies thus will address the unique requirements inherent to the project’s VCI. BioAssist, as a technology provider partner, will work closely with the project team to ensure that the app meets the needs of the project. The app will be developed using the latest technologies and will be accessible to participants in a variety of languages.

antonispardos@bioassist.gr

Eticas came into existence 10 years ago funded by Gemma Galdón Clavell, with a clear mission: to protect people and the environment in technology processes. Since then, Eticas has joined countless projects as an ethics partner analysing the social impact, desirability and acceptability of AI systems and data processes, as well auditing algorithms for risks and biases, and suggesting mitigation measures and recommendations to make sure new technologies are deployed with responsibility.

In collaboration with Fundacion EDS and HUA, Eticas will ensure the project’s ethical compliance with EU standards. This includes addressing ethics challenges, data protection, AI trustworthiness, and cybersecurity. Comprehensive monitoring and reporting will be conducted to ensure ethical adherence throughout the project. Simultaneously, ETICAS will lead, with support from HUA and EHMA, the task of organising, safeguarding, and utilising knowledge generated by MELIORA. This involves outlining an innovation and intellectual property management strategy, ensuring sustainable and impactful outcomes. The project will develop and update an exploitation and sustainability plan, covering innovation and IPR management strategy.

arancha.cienfuegos@eticas.ai