FUTURE Days has as a purpose to bring speakers from different parts of the society, working in the areas of healthcare and life science, and from different countries, to give knowledge and inspiration to Swedish stakeholders and at the same time bring a Swedish perspective back to our foreign guests.
Alexandre Guedes da Silva
President of the Portuguese Multiple Sclerosis Society, SPEM and a Naval Architect. He has had a various career and with this rich journey of experiences, he can bring useful contributions to those in SPEM who is concerned with caring and giving dignity every day. It makes him today an active Patient Advocate also in the World Patients Alliance and the Portuguese National Hub for Brain Health.
Amanda Rydén
President, Young Diabetes, a part of the the Swedish Diabetes Organisation. Young Diabetes is dedicated to supporting young people aged 15–30 living with diabetes through initiatives such as camps, knowledge dissemination and advocacy work. Amanda has lived with type 1 diabetes since 2016. She has been actively involved in the Swedish Diabetes Association since 2018 in various roles, became a member of the Young Diabetes Council in 2021, and has served as its chairperson since 2022. Alongside her engagement in Young Diabetes, she studies law.
Anders Blanck
Senior Advisor, Life Science and Healthcare. Former CEO of the Industry Organisation for Pharmaceutical Companies in Sweden, LIF. Chairman of the Board of Leading Healthcare Foundation.
Anders Åkesson
President, The Swedish HeartLung Association. He is a former Regional Deputy Councellor in Region Skåne with responsibility for Primary Care, Psychiatric Care and Drugs. Since 2019 he is also a Senior Advisor at Rud Pedersen Public Affairs.
Anna Barsk Holmbom
President of Hjärnkraft, the Swedish Association for Acquired Brain Damage. She is also CEO of ABH Education and Consulting in the field of personal assistance for the disabled. She has more than 30 years of experience working for rights and adapted support for people with disabilities.
Annika Szabo Portela
Executive Director, Digital Futures KTH – Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm. Forner Managing Director of EIT Health Scandinavia. She has a doctoral degree from the Department of Clinical Science, Intervention and Technology, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden.
Ann-Sofie Andersson-Ward
Patient Access & Growth Lead CNS Sweden, Teva. She has a background working with Vision Zero Cancer as Transformation Leader and from both Kaiku Health and Elekta as Global Strategic Sales Manager, to mention a few experiences from her professional life.
Antonio Parenti
Director DG SANTE B – Public health, Cancer and Health security, European Commission. Earlier he has served as e.g the Head of the European Commission Representation in Italy, as Minister Counsellor, Head of Section Economics, Trade Development for the Delegation of the EU to the UN and as EU Chief Negotiator for the UN Global Compact on Migration.
Azita Hedayati
CEO, True Dose – making individualized dosing possible in cancer treatment at home. She has a degree in Chemical Engineering, and together with entrepreneurial skills, she has been the founder of several businesses.
Bengt-Ivar Fransson
Public Affairs Manager, Specialty Care, Vaccines and General Medicines, Sanofi Sweden. He has a long experience from different roles in the pharma industry.
Billie Pettersson
Patient Focused Market Access and Public Affairs Leader, Sanofi Sweden. She has over 20 years of experience from the pharma industry in different roles e.g as Global Senior Director – Integrated Patient Centricity Strategies, AstraZeneca, and Global Reimbursement Director, Amgen. Another important experience and a part of the knowledge on societal issues, comes from a period of work at the Swedish Governmental Office for Finance.
Brian Kennedy
Executive Director, Global Alliance for Patient Access an international non-profit platform for person-centred care. For over two decades, his professional career has spanned the practice of law, campaign politics, corporate public affairs and health advocacy. He has served as the organizer, manager and/or a strategic consultant to dozens of non-profit organizations, coalitions and societies, including the Clinical Neurological Society of America and the International Atherosclerosis Society.
Björn Eriksson
Director General, The National Board on Health and Welfare. As former General Director of the Swedish Medical Products Agency, and with a long experience from healthcare being a cardiologist and former Director of Healthcare in the Regions of Stockholm, Skåne and Jämtland-Härjedalen, Björn has a good insight into both Sweden’s as well as other countries healthcare systems.
Bo Norrving
Professor in neurology at Lund University, Sweden. He has authored >700 publications on clinical stroke research including e g the Swedish Aspirin Low Dose Study, and the world’s largest study of stroke in the young. Founder of Riksstroke, the world’s 1st national stroke registry. Member of the advisory group for ICH 11 at WHO and was the President of the World Stroke Organization (WSO) 2008-2012, continued as Immediate Past President till 2016 being the WSO liaison person with WHO and the UN. He chairs the WSO Global Policy Committee.
Carina Petersson
President, Swedish Stroke Organisation. She has been a teacher for many years in her hometown Halmstad in the southern part of Sweden. Her husband got a stroke when he was 50 and Carina was 43 years old and they had teenage children. The world was turned upside and down, but now many years later Carina is till involved in these topics.
Cecilia Linde
Professor and consultant in cardiology, Karolinska University Hospital in Stockholm, Sweden. Her research focuses on epidemiology and devices for use in heart failure. President-Elect of the ESC – European Society of Cardiology, where she has been responsible for working groups, councils, women, the young and the membership committee and serves as member of the Congress Programme Committee as topic chair for arrhythmia. Board member of the European Heart Rhythm Association (EHRA) and scientific programme Chair 2013–2015 and has served on many guidelines writing committees of EHRA and Heart Failure Association.
Cecilia Winberg
President, the Swedish Physio Theraputist Organisation. She is a PhD Physiotherapeutist within Rehabilitation Medicine and Specialized Physiotherapist in Neurology. Previuosly, she worked as Manager at the Rehabilitation department at Ystad Hospital, Region Skåne and also as an entrepreneur.
Christi Deaton
Emerita Professor of Nursing at the University of Cambridge School of Clinical Medicine, and Cambridge University Hospitals. Her research that focuses on heart failure HF, especially management of patients with HF with preserved ejection fraction across health services. She has led programmes to develop research capacity and capability among nurses, midwives and AHPs regionally and nationally, and remains a mentor to aspiring researchers. Christi has contributed to various ESC statements and is a fellow of ESC, AHA and American Academy of Nurses.
Daniel Akanine
National Technology Officer, Microsoft, Sweden. Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering Sciences (IVA), Member of the advisory board for the Governmental partnership for Advanced Digitalization Program in Sweden, and Board Member of ECPAT Sweden – research, advocacy and action to end the sexual exploitation of children. He has also a background in Computational Neuroscience.
Daniel Ågren
PhD, Ecosystem Shaping Partner and former Personalised Health Care Lead, Roche Sweden. He has a holistic view of healthcare and life science where the patient’s needs is in the centre of interest, and to be solved together with partners in other parts of the society.
Désirée Pethrus
Former Member of Parliament and former Regional Counsellor, Region Stockholm, Sweden. Before her extensive political career, she worked as a sociologist, and she is also a life-long migraine patient.
Eduardo Pisani
CEO, All.Can International and Founder of EPSTRA, a company working with leadership and policy strategies. As the leader of All.Can, he is a well-known speaker in the cancer area of healthcare but also passionate public health advocate with 30+ years experience in law, government affairs and policy, public affairs and stakeholder engagement.
Elisabeth Ericson
Senior Communications Advisor and Moderator with more than 25 years of experience in strategic and operational communication. Throughout her career, she has partnered with leaders across the private and public sectors to advance important societal issues, strengthen organizational voices, and create lasting impact in complex environments.
Driven by a strong personal commitment to the public sphere, she thrives at the intersection of business, government, academia, and civil society. She is known for her ability to build trust, navigate sensitive topics, and create constructive dialogue.
Elisabetta Zanon
CEO, European Cancer Organisation (with 40 member organisations, both HCPs and patients’). Former Director of EU Public Affairs & Advocacy, Alliance for Regenerative Medicine (ARM), Director of Policy and Director of ESC – European Society of Cardiology Brussels Office and Director of National Health Services – NHS European Office, Brussels.
Elisabeth Dupont
Joined International Diabetes Federation Europe in October 2019 as IDF Europe Regional Manager. Prior to joining IDF Europe, she has been working for more than 15 years as senior project manager for the International Network for Cancer Treatment and Research, the African Cancer Registry Network and the US National Cancer Institute Center of Global Health. Elisabeth is passionate about promoting collaboration & partnerships and putting the voice of people living with chronic conditions, including diabetes, center stage.
Erik Linderberg
Sustainability Manager, Novo Nordisk Sweden. He has got a long experience from the pharmaceutical industry and is now engaged in climate changes and sustainability initiatives for healthcare and life science.
Erik Lundbom
Senior Analyst, Verian Group, Sweden. With over 25 years of experience form conducting analyses and research from identification needs to presentations, e.g Senion Analyst at Observer Sweden, Analyses Manager at Cision Sweden and sice 2009 at Verian Group. Erik is responsible for the annual reputation index, a recurrent measurement of well-known brands and their reputation within the public.
Eva Helmersson
President NEURO – The Swedish NEURO Patient Organisation.Former Communication- and Project Co-ordinator, EUPATI Sweden. With her own experience from living with MS, patient collaboration is something very important to her.
Eva-Lena Jansson
President, Swedish Parkinson’s Association. Former Member of Swedish Parliament and the Committee on Social Insurance and the Committee on Labour Market.
Eva-Maria Strömsholm
Co-Founder and vice President of the Finnish Association of Gynaecological Cancer Patients. A teacher, nurse and patient advocate, chair of the NGPO Nordic network, supporting individuals affected by gynaecological cancers. As a cancer patient herself, with experience of both a rare ovarian cancer and thyroid cancer, she brings personal insight to her advocacy work. She is a member of the WHO/IARC working group on cervical cancer screening.
Ewa Ellis
ATMP-coordinator (ATMP – Cell and Gene Therapy), Karolinska University Hospital. Associate Professor and Senior Researcher at the Department of Clinical Science, Intervention and Technology (CLINTEC), Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden.
Fausto Pinto
Professor of Cardiology, Head of the Cardiology Dep. and the Heart and Vascular Dep. of Santa Maria University Hospital, Lisbon. Former President of the World Heart Federation WHF 2021-2022 and the European Society of Cardiology, ESC 2014-2016. He is a Fellow of the ESC (FESC), American College of Cardiology (FACC), American Society of Angiology (FASA), Society for Cardiac Angiography and Interventions (FSCAI) and the American Society of Echocardiography (FASE) and Honorary Member of several international societies.
Francesca Colombo
M.Sc. is Head of the Health Division at OECD, Paris. She is responsible for work on health, providing internationally comparable data on health systems and applying economic analysis to health policies, advising policy makers, stakeholders and citizens on how to respond to demands for more and better health care and make health systems more people centred.
She has over 25 years of experience leading international activities on health and health systems. The results of the work she leads have informed policy-making processes at national and intergovernmental level across topics such as patient-reported outcomes and experiences of healthcare, health workforce, chronic diseases, health system resilience and sustainability.
Fredrik Sverdberg
President, Swedish Lung Cancer Organisation. He is working as support pedagogue.
Hans Grönlund
Assistant Professor of immunology, heading the Therapeutic immune design Unit (TID) Department of Clinical Neuroscience, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm. The research has important possibilities for curative attempts in multiple sclerosis, allergy and cancer. He has also experience from life science-companies as the founder of NEOGAP and Medi-Tec AB.
Hugo Lövheim
Professor, specialist trained MD at the Institution of Community Medicine and Rehabilitization, Unit Manager, the Geriatrics Unit, Umeå University, Sweden. His research includes e.g. studies if Alzheimer’s disease is connected to herpes infections.
Jan Stenman
Network Lead Healthcare Development, Roche Diagnostics Sverige. Working with the role of diagnostics in decision making, care processes and introduction of digital support in healthcare, with experience from research to clinical application.
Janna Strandli
President, The Lyme disease and TBE Organisation in Sweden since 2016. When she was diagnosed herself with ME/CFS and myalgia, she felt that the information she got, that nothing could be done about it, encouraged her to seek for more knowledge and the interest for orthomolecular has grown since then.
Jessica Martinsson
Director General & CEO SwedenBio, the national organisation of the life science industry in Sweden. With a background as research chemist, she has worked in the pharmaceutical companies and has also been the co-founder and CEO of Sprint Bioscience.
Joakim Ramsberg
Head of science and society at the Swedish Brain Foundation. Adjunct researcher, Department of Neurobiology, Care Sciences and Society, Karolinska Institutet. Earlier Project Director, the Agency for Health and Care Services Analysis. Senior Harkness Fellow of the Commonwealth Fund.
Johan Järte
Senior Radiology Consultant. Medical Director, Oriola, Sweden, and several engagements in life science companies over the years.
Johan Loock
President of the Swedish Headache Organisation. He is Member of the Committee on Healthcare, and the Council for Accessibility, Region Jämtland-Härjedalen and Group Leader, The Moderate Party in Bräcke municipality.
Johan Orbe
Senior Analyst, Verian Group, Sweden. With close to 30 years of market research, analysis and external monitoring. The past 15 years, Johan has primarily worked with several of the biggest organisations in public sector and civil society.
Jolanta Bilinska
Founding Director and Treasurer of the World Patient Alliance (WPA). She works as Director of Development and Social Communication at the City Medical Centre, Dr. K. Jonscher in Łódź, Poland and is also the Founder of the Polish Patient Safety Foundation.
Lars Edvinsson
Professor of Internal Medicine and Emergency Medicine, Lund University, Sweden and Professor in Receptor Regulation Cerebrovascular and Cardiovascular Diseases, Copenhagen University, Danmark. President of The International Headache Society. Chairman of the Swedish Migraine Society. Board Member of the European Headache Foundation, past president of International Headache Society.
He is leading expert in the field of cerebral circulation and migraine, and world recognized for his work on vascular innervation and receptor regulation. His extensive research has been a major contributor to what is known about the roles of the cerebral vasculature in health and diseases such as stroke and primary headaches.
Lena Coulibaly
Responsible Public Affairs Healthcare sector, GS1 Sweden. She has extensive experience in assisting companies in achieving increased efficiency in their supply chains and enable traceable value chains using open global standards. One focus area right now is data driven sustainability and how supply chain transparency and data sharing can help enable a more circular economy.
Lena Kock
President, The Swedish Dementia Organisation. She has been active in the organisation for more than 20 years in different positions, among other things working with development of dementia care. She has also experience from working as Process Developer at the Study Association Vuxenskolan (adult education).
Lena Strömberg
Director and CEO at Medtech4Health, which is a Strategic Innovation Programme at the governmental innovation agency Vinnova within medtech. She has a long experience from working with Science Parks, incubators etc about supporting innovations.
Liselotte Jansson
Secretary General, The Alzheimer Foundation, Sweden. Chair of the Board of the Centre for Molecular Medicine (CMM), Karolinska Institute, Chair of the Board of FINGERS Brain Health Institute and Member of the Board of AlzeCure.
Magdalena Daccord
CEO, FH Europe Foundation, the European Network of patient organizations advocating for people living with familial hyperlipidaemias. Most of them are serious inherited cardiovascular risk factors which lead to premature heart attacks, strokes and even death.
Prior to joining FH Europe, Magdalena led the EMEA operations at DIA (Drug Information Association) and has worked for over 7 years in the pharmaceutical industry in the orphan drugs and rare diseases space.
Magnus Lejelöv
CEO of STUNS Life Science working with the Life Science Eco System in Uppsala. Former Head of Sales, Pelago Bioscience and CEO, Colivia – a healthcare start-up. He has a long career in the pharma industry and is an experienced moderator with 400 recorded podcasts regarding the Health Care system in the Nordics from different angles.
Maria Andersson Ödman
Assistant Chief Operating Officer, The Blood and Tumour disease department, Academic Hospital, Uppsala, Sweden. Was appointed the Prize “The Drug Profile of the Year 2023” by the news agency Läkemedelsmarknaden (The Drug Market) for the work to make cancer care more accessible.
Maria Cavalli
Founder of NADIO, that stands for Need, Ask, Develop, Implement and Organize. Digital services that are based on the needs of the users, coming from her own experience, when her father was diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s at the age of 50 years old. The first digital service, En Bra Plats 2009, was built on the needs she, her family and many other carers have. After that, Demenslotsen was created 2018 and Alzheimerguiden 2022.
Maria Linné
Project Leader, YTAN (The Surface) Young Together Against Neurodegenerative Diseases – virtual support for young relatives to people with neurological disorders. Project Leader and Member of the Board of the Swedish National Organisation for Huntington’s Disease. Previous Manager at Bräcke Deakonry, Gothenburg.
Maria Soares Lindberg
Deputy Secretary General, Young Cancer, Sweden. Former Strategic Advisor to the Secretary General, Save the Children, Sweden.
Marit Jenset
Secretary General, Swedish Breast Cancer Association. Honorary Secretary, Design for all, Sweden. Former CEO, the Neuro Organisation in Sweden.
Mattias Hellström
Co-Founder to the initiative FOKUS Patient and CEO, Citizens Affairs AB, which is the legal part of FOKUS Patient. CA is the public affairs agency that offers services to all kind of stakeholders in healthcare and life science. He is a serial entrepreneur and has worked in a wide range of industries that all together makes a good foundation for working in this field and the surrounding society.
Mikaela Odemyr
President, The Swedish Organisation for Asthma-Allergy. Member of the Board of The European Lung Foundation and former Chair of the ELF Patient Advisory Committee. She is also Past President of the European Federation of Allergy and Airways Diseases Patients’ Associations, EFA.
Nadja Fagrell Trygg
Senior Research Officer, Forte: Swedish Research Council for Health, Working life and Welfare. At Forte, Nadja is the contact person for the European Partnership Brain Health and the initiative on women’s health and diseases as well as the initiative on prevention and public health. Nadja has previous experience from working at The Public Health Agency of Sweden and completed her PhD at Umeå University.
Niklas Arnberg
Professor, the Institution of Clinical Micro-Biology, Department of Virology ad Professor and Group Leader at the Molecular Infection Medicine Sweden (MIMS) at Umeå University.
Niklas Hedberg
Chief Pharmacist at TLV, The Dental and Pharmaceutical Benefits Agency and Co-chair of the EU Member State Coordination Group on Health Technology Assessment (HTACG). He has a broad experience of different aspects of value-based evaluation and over time has seen the increasing importance for health technology assessment (HTA) both across healthcare systems and on local level to prepare accurate decision-making.
Penilla Gunther
Founder FOKUS Patient. Former Member of Swedish Parliament, Member of Cancer Mission Board, The European Commission and President, European Patient Safety Foundation. President of VIKING – a patient organisation for heart- lung transplanted patients. She has, with her own experience from being a former policy maker and from being a patient with cancer and a heart transplant e.g, become a frequent speaker at different healthcare and life science events in Europe.
Petra Eurenius
Co-founder of FOKUS Patient. Senior Consultant & Advisor in life science at The Stockholm Project/Rud Pedersen Group. She has over 25 years of experience in strategic and operational communication, including as Nordic-Baltic Communications Director at AstraZeneca, Pfizer and Pharmacia. She has also led patient advocacy initiatives and corporate social responsibility projects involving collaboration with PAGs, NGOs, academia, and authorities.
Simon Körösi
Medical doctor, CEO of Geras Solutions – Minnesmottagningen.se – the only digital memory clinic in the Nordics, initiated by the founders of Silviahemmet. Geras Solutions work to improve accuracy and availability in cognitive care for people directly or indirectly affected by cognitive impairment and cognitive disorders such as Alzheimer’s. Simon’s work focuses on early detection and prevention of cognitive decline, follow-up and system level implementation in cognitive care.
Sophie Millar
EU Policy and Advocacy Manager for Cardiovascular Health, European Society of Cardiology, Brussels. Former Associate Director, Healthcare Systems at EFPIA – European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries, and has also got experiences from working with obesity, diabetes and Alzheimer’s disease.
Stéphane Boulanger
EUPSF Policy Advisor, Founder of TRASA, a consultant agency. As a policy advisor for the European Patient Safety Foundation, he is supporting the foundation with documents and information about projects and actual events in patient safety at a European level.
Susanne Frykman
Senior Research Officer, Swedish Research Council, working with European Partnerships and other EU and international funding mechanisms. Contact person for the European Partnership Brain Health. She has worked at European Research Executive Agency – REA in Brussels and at the Karolinska Institute as Associate Professor and Project Manager of a research project on Synaptic degeneration in Alzheimer Disease.
Sven Jonsson
Chairman of the Swedish Kidney Association Stockholm Gotland. Senior Consultant within eHealth, Medical Tehnology and Enterprise and business development. Lead Patient, Certified Grief Recovery Specialist.
Thomas Hofmarcher
Research Director, The Swedish Institute for Health Economics, IHE. He is a health economist with a special research interest in cancer, focusing on enhancing patient lives while acknowledging the fiscal realities. Recognizing that health budgets are finite, he advocates for value-for-money in healthcare, ensuring benefits for both patients and taxpayers. Thomas firmly believes in harnessing evidence-based, innovative technologies to enhance patient well-being and advance health systems.
Thomas Magnusson
President, Diabetes Sweden. He is living with diabetes T2 since many years and is a strong voice for increased knowledge, better care and equal access to modern drugs and medtech for people with diabetes.
Thomas Straumits
Client Executive Business Development, EY Sweden. Earlier Strategic Business Consultant, Strategic Lead, Mid-Europe and other positions in Hungary and Sweden for MSD.
Ulrica Sundholm
Secretary General, The Swedish National Heart Lung Organisation. She worked earlier as Manager, division of Knowledge and Support as well as division of Care and Support at the Swedish Cancer Society. Before that, she served as e.g Political Expert at the Swedish Governmental Office on Social Affairs.
Wilhelmina Hoffman
Principal, The Siliviahemmet Foundation and Direktor, Swedish Dementia Centre, Stockholm. Dementia Education and Care for Quality of Life. Silviahemmet’s work to spread knowledge about dementia care was initiated by HM Queen Silvia. Swerdish Dementia Centre is the national centre for excellence in the field of dementia.
Ylva Trolle Lagerros
Professor and Specialist Internal Medicine, the Obesity Unit, Dep. of Medicine, Clinic of Endocrinology, Metabolism and Diabetes, Karolinska University Hospital and the Unit of Clinical Epidemiology, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden.
Yvan Devaux
Head of the Cardiovascular Research Unit at Luxemburg Institute of Health, LIH. Using a thoroughly validated experimental pipeline including both discovery and validation phases, Yvan and his group aim to identify novel biomarkers of acute cardiac conditions such as acute myocardial infarction, cardiac arrest, heart failure, aortic stenosis and stroke. His research group focuses on RNAs and particularly non-coding RNAs such as microRNAs and long non-coding RNAs.
Åsa Konradsson-Geuken
Associate Professor in pharmacology, Uppsala University. President of the Swedish Schizophrenia Association and President, EUFAMI – European Federation of Associations of Families of People with Mental Illness. She is also a Member of the Center for Women’s Mental Health and Member of the Steering Committee for The National Network for Patient’s with newly onset psychosis.