First hackathon to foster health solutions

First hackathon to foster health solutions
Media Release
University of Auckland
16 January 2015

First hackathon to foster health solutions

Software developers, medical specialists, healthcare professionals and people with long term health issues such as diabetes, asthma and heart problems, will be gathering in Auckland for a weekend to create novel health technology solutions next month.

The inaugural ‘Health Hackathon: Solving self-care’ takes place over a weekend in mid-February and is attracting interest from around New Zealand and overseas.

A hackathon is a collaborative competition – a free event that brings together people with a range of relevant talents, to discuss, brainstorm, and create technical solutions in response to a problem.

The Health Hackathon from 13th to 15th February is hosted by Health Informatics NZ and the University of Auckland at the Tamaki Innovation Campus in Glen Innes.

It’s led by Dr Karen Day who is conducting research as part of the hackathon event, into ‘stimulating innovative health care solutions’. She is also the director for the postgraduate programme in health informatics and teaches associated courses.

“This health hackathon is an opportunity for people with a range of expertise to get together to work on technical solutions for people with health problems,” says Karen Day. “They volunteer their time, talents and energy to collaborate on developing technology solutions – in this case to solve the problem of self-care for long-term health issues.”

“There are 90 places and registrations are coming in quickly,” she says. “The spirit of the hackathon is about openness to collaborate creativity, similar to the spirit that is well known about open source software.”

“Hackathons are a collaborative phenomenon around the world and attract a lot of interest globally,” says Karen. “We have had people from Australia, America and the United Kingdom enquire about the event.”

“For many, the attraction is the creative buzz and unique experience of taking part in developing a solution with all the content, expertise and support available there to push on and create an outcome,” says Karen. “They say it’s an incredible experience, being together and working on a solution to a problem in an intensely creative and supportive atmosphere.

"Teams are often so energised by it, they will work through the night during the hackathon if you don’t stop them."

“People attending the hackathon with a long-term health issue can identify a team that they want to work with, or present an idea they want to work on,” she says. “At the start of the hackathon, people pitch their ideas, and teams are formed with a balance of roles, (such as health professionals, software developers, and healthcare consumers) to work on a specific problem.”

Karen expects they will have teams of four to eight people, each working on a particular long-term health self-care issue. The solution might be a software device app, new website, SMS product or other service.

“Each person brings their particular knowledge and skills to help people and working together, push themselves with problem solving to create a solution,” says Karen. “A lot of those taking part are very experienced and highly qualified people.”

The health hackathon also attracts experienced and skilled mentors who can move from group to group, asking relevant questions and challenging each team’s thinking, and ideally, entrepreneurs and angel investors with start-up capital who can see potential in a group’s solution and might be able to help them take it to the market.

At the end of the weekend, each team presents its idea to a panel of four judges who decide on the best idea from the health hackathon, depending on its clinical accuracy and appropriateness, consumer usefulness, software excellence, and commercial potential.

These presentations are filmed and put on the Health Informatics NZ website for the People’s Vote that allows the public to pick an idea. The winner of the prestigious People’s Vote is the solution with the most votes by 14thMarch.

The research aspect of the Health Hackathon is to understand how the teams progress their self-care solutions and how these solutions can be helpful.

For more information on this Health Hackathon at Tamaki Innovation Campus, University of Auckland, February 13 to 15 go to the website, Health Hackathon: Solving Self-care at https://www.fmhs.auckland.ac.nz/en/soph/about/hackathon-registration.html ,Karen’s blog on the hackathon at Day by Day https://kdayinformatix.wordpress.com/ and Twitter hastag #hacknz2015

ENDS

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