University of Manchester conference squares up to medtech legal challenges

A new branch of innovative medical technologies coming to market with the potential to tackle some of the biggest healthcare disparities facing the healthcare sector brings with it a swathe of new legal challenges, but an event hosted by the University of Manchester School of Law aims to face these legal debates head on for the first time.

Medical technology has the power to disrupt the field of healthcare, potentially flattening barriers to care and allowing more patients access to medical expertise when they need it, but what are the legal implications?

The University of Manchester’s School of Law, in partnership with the School of Law, Queen Mary, University of London, is hosting Healthcare disparities: Disruptive healthcare technologies and the patient, where a number of leading legal brains will present the new challenges facing medicine and the law as a result of new innovations and the shifting political landscape.

The CPD-approved event - which is sponsored by the Hallsworth Endowment and the School of Law at the University of Manchester, and supported by Queen Mary, University of London, the European Association of Health Law, and the World Association of Medical Law - is the first of its kind and does not shy away from important legal questions.

Among the matters up for discussion by eminent speakers are reproductive choices, the impact of Brexit on health law, big data and precision medicine, trust and regulation of medical apps, and what happens to our health data after we die.

The event’s first keynote will be delivered by Professor Nicolas Terry, Hall Render Professor of Law at Indiana University Robert H McKinney School of Law. Terry will examine how disruptive healthcare technologies should reduce health inequalities, but how they may not when taking into account regulation.

In addition, Professor Mette Hartlev, director of the Centre for Legal Studies in Welfare and Market and the University of Copenhagen will tackle precision medicine, big data and health disparities in her keynote, looking at e-healthcare and the rights of the patient, while Professor Richard Ashcroft of Queen Mary, University of London, will examine innovation, regulation and justice in healthcare technologies. A full spectrum of the legal challenges faced due to disruptive healthcare technologies will be touched upon in the event’s other keynotes and breakout sessions.

Chaired and masterminded by University of Manchester Professor of Medical Law Professor Nicola Glover-Thomas, Healthcare disparities: Disruptive healthcare technologies and the patient will take place from 13-14 June 2019.