11th HTA Conference
HealThink was proud to sponsor the 11th HTA Conference, the largest annual conference on Health Technology Assessment in Greece. The conference took place on September 24, 2026, at the Divani Caravel Hotel in Athens, under the theme “Aligning Evidence, Innovation and Access in Greece and Europe’s Evolving HTA Landscape”.
With the EU HTA Regulation in effect since January 2025, this year’s edition carried particular strategic significance. The conference brought together 18 Greek and 7 international speakers and more than 180 participants, including health professionals, researchers, academics, policymakers, industry representatives and patient advocates. Across five sessions, the discussions covered the first lessons from Joint Clinical Assessments, Greece’s position within the new European framework, the gap between HTA decisions and reimbursement reality, medical devices and biotech, and meaningful patient participation.
Panos Stafylas, Scientific Director of HealThink, moderated SESSION 2 | BEYOND HTA: THE PRICING AND REIMBURSEMENT LANDSCAPE FOR INNOVATIVE MEDICINES IN GREECE, which was focused on what happens after the HTA evaluation: how pricing and reimbursement decisions are made for innovative medicines in Greece, and how they connect to patient access. The session featured contributions from Nandia Gogozotou (President of the National Health Service Agency (EOPYY), President of the Drug Price Negotiation Committee, President of the Committee for the Pharmaceutical Innovation Fund), Nikos Dedes (Secretary General, Greek Patients’ Association, President of Positive Voice), George Tsiakalakis (Market Access & External Affairs Director, Bristol Myers Squibb Greece) and Antonis Karokis (External Affairs Director, MSD).
Panos Stafylas also took part as a speaker in PANEL DISCUSSION | MEDICAL DEVICES AND BIOTECH: THE OVERLOOKED FRONTIER OF HTA. In his intervention, he focused on the challenges of assessing medical devices in Europe and presented figures that illustrate the scale of the issue:
The European Union has recorded around 500,000 different types of technologies, and approximately 35,000 medical device companies operate in Europe, 92% of which are small and medium-sized enterprises. Between 2021 and 2024, only 7,000 products received CE marking.
The expected HTA body for medical devices will initially cover only products that go through a Joint Clinical Assessment, which means around 15 products at most within the first year. All other products will remain outside the process. As he noted, much of Europe’s production capacity, which has been funded with significant resources, therefore remains untapped.
Dr. Stafylas also pointed out that the requirements of the Medical Device Regulation, published in 2017 and applicable since 2020, have multiplied, and that most companies lack the additional resources needed to meet them. He stressed that the assessment framework for medical devices must be fast and dynamic. A device with embedded software that uses data and evolves continuously cannot wait for a process requiring six months of work and data collection, because by the time a decision is reached, it will already be outdated.
You can read more about his intervention in the related Health Daily article (in Greek) here.
More details about the conference here.
With the EU HTA Regulation in effect since January 2025, this year’s edition carried particular strategic significance. The conference brought together 18 Greek and 7 international speakers and more than 180 participants, including health professionals, researchers, academics, policymakers, industry representatives and patient advocates. Across five sessions, the discussions covered the first lessons from Joint Clinical Assessments, Greece’s position within the new European framework, the gap between HTA decisions and reimbursement reality, medical devices and biotech, and meaningful patient participation.
Panos Stafylas, Scientific Director of HealThink, moderated SESSION 2 | BEYOND HTA: THE PRICING AND REIMBURSEMENT LANDSCAPE FOR INNOVATIVE MEDICINES IN GREECE, which was focused on what happens after the HTA evaluation: how pricing and reimbursement decisions are made for innovative medicines in Greece, and how they connect to patient access. The session featured contributions from Nandia Gogozotou (President of the National Health Service Agency (EOPYY), President of the Drug Price Negotiation Committee, President of the Committee for the Pharmaceutical Innovation Fund), Nikos Dedes (Secretary General, Greek Patients’ Association, President of Positive Voice), George Tsiakalakis (Market Access & External Affairs Director, Bristol Myers Squibb Greece) and Antonis Karokis (External Affairs Director, MSD).
Panos Stafylas also took part as a speaker in PANEL DISCUSSION | MEDICAL DEVICES AND BIOTECH: THE OVERLOOKED FRONTIER OF HTA. In his intervention, he focused on the challenges of assessing medical devices in Europe and presented figures that illustrate the scale of the issue:
The European Union has recorded around 500,000 different types of technologies, and approximately 35,000 medical device companies operate in Europe, 92% of which are small and medium-sized enterprises. Between 2021 and 2024, only 7,000 products received CE marking.
The expected HTA body for medical devices will initially cover only products that go through a Joint Clinical Assessment, which means around 15 products at most within the first year. All other products will remain outside the process. As he noted, much of Europe’s production capacity, which has been funded with significant resources, therefore remains untapped.
Dr. Stafylas also pointed out that the requirements of the Medical Device Regulation, published in 2017 and applicable since 2020, have multiplied, and that most companies lack the additional resources needed to meet them. He stressed that the assessment framework for medical devices must be fast and dynamic. A device with embedded software that uses data and evolves continuously cannot wait for a process requiring six months of work and data collection, because by the time a decision is reached, it will already be outdated.
You can read more about his intervention in the related Health Daily article (in Greek) here.
More details about the conference here.