Challenges

Have a problem in healthcare that you think technology could help fix? Want to see what creative developers might do with access to new datasets or platforms? Anyone can sponsor a challenge. You can be a foundation, academic institution, investor, government agency, technology company or healthcare organization. If you have a question, you never know who might have a solution. For more details see the FAQs here. Submit a challenge here!

ChildObesity180 logo

Active Schools Acceleration Project Innovation Competition

To a significant degree, we have engineered physical activity out of our lives. Many neighborhoods and communities have been designed for car use, rather than pedestrians or public transit. The purpose of the ASAP Innovation Competition is to identify, reward, and scale innovative and impactful physical activity programs and technologies with excellent promise to motivate quality physical activity at school and beyond. The ultimate goal is to develop, guide, and scale the most promising of these innovations so they may reach children in schools across the country.

  • Total Prizes: Two Grand Prize Winners receive $50,000 and a pilot opportunity
  • Deadline: April 2, 2012
Health Innovations in Commuting Challenge screenshot

Health Innovations in Commuting Challenge

Currently, commuting is an essential and growing component of daily life for most American workers, making up about 20% of all trips taken—a significant percentage of the lives of one of the most critical segments of the American economy. ONC is challenging innovators to propose models for improving the health of American commuters through better collection, exchange and analysis of health data.

  • Total Prizes: Webinar and opportunities to collaborate with industry leaders
  • Deadline: March 5, 2012
Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) logo

EHR Accessibility Module Challenge

The disabled population faces considerable difficulties with accessing and receiving care and the lack of coordinated care for this population is particularly costly. Health information technology (HIT) and electronic health records (EHRs) hold great promise in improving the health outcomes and coordination of care for people with disabilities. Accessibility and usability in health IT are high priority issues for the disabled community. A consumer-oriented system providing easy-to-use access to health information would be a valuable tool and significantly improve the health of disabled individuals. ONC is challenging multidisciplinary teams to create and test a module or application that makes it easy for disabled consumers to access and interact with the health data stored in their EHRs.

  • Total Prizes: $85,000 + extras
  • Deadline: July 23, 2012
Discharge Follow-Up Appointment Challenge screenshot

Discharge Follow-Up Appointment Challenge

In order to support broader adoption and uptake of promising IT-enabled interventions that address care transitions, ONC is challenging software developers to create an easy-to-use web-based tool that will make post-discharge follow-up appointment scheduling a more effective and shared process for care providers, patients and caregivers.

  • Total Prizes: $5,000 + extras
  • Deadline: April 30, 2012
US Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT logo

Healthy People 2020 Leading Health Indicators App Challenge

The Leading Health Indicators are the nation’s critical health priorities and are part of the Healthy People 2020 initiative. The indicators will be used by policymakers and health professionals to track progress in local communities as they work toward meeting national health goals. Developers and public health experts are asked to co-design an application that makes the health indicators customizable and easy to use. Successful applications will make it easy for users to use the Healthy People 2020 Leading Health Indicators (LHIs) and mash up data in meaningful ways.

  • Total Prizes: $15,000 + Demo Opportunity At National Conference
  • Deadline: March 9, 2012
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) + Aligning Forces for Quality (AF4Q) logo

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Aligning Forces Challenge

Aligning Forces For Quality (AF4Q) is the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s (RWJF) signature effort to lift the overall quality of health care in targeted communities, reduce racial and ethnic disparities and provide models for national reform. The premise of Aligning Forces is that no single person, group or profession can improve health and health care throughout a community without support of others. RWJF and Aligning Forces are challenging developers to develop an application that helps patients access better health care using publicly available inpatient and outpatient measures of health care quality from the Aligning Forces program.

  • Total Prizes: $130,000
  • Deadline: January 5, 2012
ONC logo

popHealth Tool Development Challenge

popHealth is an open source software service developed under the guidance of the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) that automates the reporting of the Stage 1 Meaningful Use clinical quality measures. The popHealth Tool Development Challenge tasks developers with creating applications that leverage the popHealth open source framework, existing functionality, standards, and sample datasets to improve patient care and provide greater insight into patient populations.

  • Total Prizes: $100,000
  • Deadline: January 20, 2012
ONC logo

One in a Million Hearts Challenge

Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death in America. The goal of the Million Hearts initiative is to prevent one million heart attacks and strokes over five years by reducing the number of people who need treatment and improving the quality of treatment for those who do need it. This challenge is a multidisciplinary call to innovators and developers to create an application that activates and empowers patients to get healthy and improve their heart health.

  • Total Prizes: $75,000
  • Deadline: Competition Closed for Judging
NCI and ONC logo

Using Public Data for Cancer Prevention and Control: From Innovation to Impact

Entrants are asked to develop innovative software applications (apps) that address challenges faced by consumers, clinicians, or researchers at one or more points on the cancer control continuum. These apps should also use public data that are relevant to cancer prevention and control, and have the potential to integrate with existing technology platforms.

  • Total Prizes: $80,000
  • Deadline: Challenge Closed and Winners Announced
Novartis logo

Novartis CardioEngagement Challenge

Create an interactive solution which enables patients to better manage their cardiovascular health through a customizable, user-friendly interface. The solution should be holistic and help organize and provide easy access to personalized health information, relevant public data, and aggregated content (ie education, treatment, diet, exercise and social network).

  • Total Prizes: $160,000
  • Deadline: Semi-Finalists Announced