Hi, my name is Miriam Cabrita and I joined the iSprint team on the 1st of March. I was born and raised in the beautiful city of Lisbon (Portugal), and in 2011 I moved to Enschede (the Netherlands) within the ERASMUS programme and have lived here ever since.
I have a background in biomedical engineering. Why? Because I have many interests and I couldn’t limit myself to a healthcare or an engineering study programme. During my ERASMUS experience at the University of Twente, I got in touch with the digital health field and since then I became extremely passionate about its potential to improve healthcare, for example by relieving the burden in the current healthcare systems but also by helping to close the health inequalities gap. In the last paragraph of my Ph.D. thesis I state “As a Biomedical Engineer, my strongest professional ambition is to contribute to the development of technology that positively impacts the life of the population”. And here I am at Innovation Sprint continuing to pursue this mission. In the last 7 years, I have worked at Roessingh Research and Development in several national and European research projects focused on the design and development of digital health solutions for the prevention and management of chronic diseases. My main research focus has been on the design of personalized strategies to promote physical activity in daily life through mobile technology. However, in the meanwhile, I have worked on the most varied topics, including virtual reality training for chronic pain therapy, interactive playgrounds for pediatric rehabilitation, and online interventions to support older adults who have recently lost their spouse. What can I say, I get easily excited as long as I believe in the final product. During these last 7 years, I have always stayed connected with the University of Twente where I was supervising student projects (BSc., MSc., and Ph.D.) and was actively involved in the study programmes of Health Sciences, Biomedical Engineering, and Creative Technology. Between 2017 and 2019 I also had the chance to contribute to the design and management of the university-level strategic programme on Personalized eHealth Technology. It was a great learning experience and helped me connect the dots between academia, industry, and healthcare organizations.
And here is where I flourish, in connecting the dots. Whether the dots are people, disciplines, projects, ideas, or organizations. I connect the dots. And this is also my contribution to the iSprint team: connecting healthcare and technology by listening and understanding the clinical and user needs and translating these needs to solutions that have a positive impact on the life of the users. I also bring in my expertise in virtual coaching in digital health solutions, namely on defining personalized strategies that help individuals to reach the most desired lifestyle behaviors for their health condition. Next to it, I want to connect to my network spread throughout the world. And what else? I share the passion and commitment to do always better, every day. And to start, I will be working on the H2020 projects TERMINET, iHelp, and RE-SAMPLE.
And if you don’t find me behind my computer screen, or playing with my 2 years old daughter, I am most likely running in the Dutch countryside. In my free time, I am more an endurance runner than a sprinter, it is all about balance.
