Cell Counter; NHS+HackDay; OpenSource+OpenEHR

Last weekend the NHS HackDay movement came to Liverpool, where a group of “Geeks who love the NHS” came together for the second event of its type. This bottom up movement for change in the NHS was started by a couple of smart junior medical doctors some months ago, with the first NHS HackDay in London in May. The Liverpool event attracted another very healthy number of clinicians and developers to work together.

The format of the two day events is very much in keeping with good practice in stimulating innovation within a complex adaptive system such as healthcare. The days start with a round of 2-minute pitches by those with ideas- they may be clinicians with ideas looking for developers or indeed developers with ideas looking for clinicians.

Those 2-minute pitches are strictly enforced, so within an hour approximately 20 very different ideas have been shared. Then the groups disperse to network and see who comes back working with who after coffee. Its a simple approach that flushes out the “wheat from the chaff” and allows small agile teams to form and get working together fast...