The conference's scientific director is Manuel Armayones, the eHealth Center's Development Director
On 29 May, the preparatory session was held at the Consorci de la Zona Franca de Barcelona for the forthcoming national COCEMFE conference, which will be held in February 2019 in Barcelona, with the title: “Disabled people's right to lifelong personal independence”.
This event was organized by COCEMFE Catalonia and attended by 41 people, including members of disabled people's organizations, representatives of different government agencies and experts, among others.
The UOC was represented by Eulàlia Hernández, professor at the Faculty of Psychology and Education Sciences, principal investigator at the PSiNET research group and coordinator of the eHealth Center's education, empowerment and health participation area; Manuel Armayones, professor at the Faculty of Psychology and Education Sciences, eHealth Center Development Director and member of the PSiNET research group; Jordi Conesa, professor at the Faculty of Computer Science, Multimedia and Telecommunications, coordinator of the eHealth Center's health data science area and member of the SMARTLEARN research group; Éder Peña, professor at the University of Caldas and visiting scholar at the eHealth Center; and Martha Lucia García, professor at the University of Manizales and doctoral student at the UOC.
This preparatory session hosted four different workshops which led to panels that summarized the subjects discussed in each working group. The workshops were the following:
Workshop 1: Safeguarding rights at each stage of the life cycle.
Workshop 2: The city as a friendly co-living space with easy access to services.
Workshop 3: ICTs at the service of improving the quality of life of each person and their environment.
Workshop 4: Management and use of collective data as a tool for social transformation.
At the end of the event, the subjects discussed in each working group were shared among all the participants and they were thanked for taking part.