Health 2.0 and ONC Launch New Challenge Through the Investing in Innovation (I2) Initiative

Today, Health 2.0 and the Office of the National Coordinator for HealthInformation Technology (ONC) announced the launch of a new Investing in Innovation (i2) Initiative competition that challenges developer communities to create innovative health information technology (HIT) solutions. The i2 program promotes the use of technology to drive better outcomes, engage users in their health and improve health care quality. The Health 2.0 Developer Challenge program is now accepting submissions for the new competition, the "SMART-Indivo App Challenge."

SMART (Substitutable Medical Apps, Reusable Technologies) is one of four Strategic Health IT Advanced Research Projects (SHARP) funded by the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology. A health care system adapting to the effects of an aging population, growing expenditures, and a diminishing primary care workforce needs the support of a flexible information infrastructure that facilitates innovation in wellness, health care, and public health.

The "SMART-Indivo App Challenge" is a multidisciplinary call to innovators and software developers to create an Indivo app that provides value to patients using data delivered through the SMART API and its Indivo-specific extensions. The app will be either an HTML5 Web app or an iOS app that runs against the Indivo Developer Sandbox, where it can access patient demographics, medications, laboratory tests, and diagnoses using Web standards. Developers could, for example, build a medication manager, a health risk detector, a patient-friendly laboratory visualization tool, or an app that integrates external data sources (see http://www.healthdata.gov/) with patient records in real time.

Submissions will be evaluated on five parameters. These parameters include: usefulness to patients, importance to clinical medicine or public health, interface and presentation, use of the Indivo and SMART APIs, and creative use of data from the sandbox and (optionally) from open health data sources. A review panel consisting of technical experts will evaluate the submissions.

Submissions are due on September 28, 2012. Prizes total $13,000, with the first place team taking home $10,000, second place $2,000 and third place $1,000. The first place winner will also present the winning solution at a national conference. For more details visit the "SMART-IndivoAppChallenge" website.

"Health 2.0 is excited to be launching this new challenge," said Indu Subaiya, CEO and Co-chair of Health 2.0. "The SMART-Indivo App Challenge is an interesting competition that embraces key Health 2.0 themes, including modularity, scalability, and interoperability. Applications developed for this challenge will help individuals to manage their health and wellness information across a range of healthcare settings."

About ONC
ONC is the principal Federal entity charged with coordination of nationwide efforts to implement and use the most advanced health information technology and the electronic exchange of health information. The position of National Coordinator was created in 2004, through an Executive Order and legislatively mandated in the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act (HITECH Act) of 2009. For more information, see http://healthit.hhs.gov/.

About Investing in Innovation (i2) Initiative
The Investing in Innovation (i2) program utilizes prizes and challenges to facilitate innovation and obtain solutions to intractable health IT problems. Aligned with the Administration's innovation agenda, i2 is the first federal program to operate under the authority of the America COMPETES Reauthorization Act of 2010, signed into law by President Obama on January 4, 2011. For details see http://www.health2challenge.org/onc-i2-challenges/.

About Health 2.0
The conference. The media network. The innovation community. The Health 2.0 Conference is the leading showcase of cutting-edge innovation transforming the health care system. Since its beginning in 2007, Health 2.0 has served as a community resource for search and online tools to help consumers manage their health and connect to providers. Now that the industry has caught up, Health 2.0 covers the entire cloud, web, mobile and unplatforms technology revolution that is shaking up every sector of health care. For more, visit htttp://www.health2con.com.

Media Contact 
Jodi Amendola
Amendola Communications for Health 2.0
480.664.8412 ext. 11
[email protected]