Health meets hack in a challenge for future digital health innovations

On May 9th the Health Hack Academy will be launched – providing a unique opportunity for those who want to improve the healthcare of tomorrow. The Health Hack Academy (HHA) is a co-creation arena for people who are experienced in the field of healthcare, patients and providers, as well as people who are skilled in digital innovations – designers, coders, app developers and general techies. At the HHA, challenges are met by teams that can bring ground-breaking ideas and radical solutions to future digital healthcare.

 The Health Hack Academy is a joint project organized by partners interested in developing the digital health care scene: Veryday, EIT ICT Labs, Stockholm Science City and Digital | Health Days. The kickoff takes places on May 9 in Stockholm when the participants will learn more about some of the challenges and meet with companies and organisations who are stakeholders in finding new solutions for the healthcare of tomorrow.

- The program contains the kickoff workshop and a 48 hour hackathon with the possibility to take part in two more workshops where the finalists will have the opportunity to further develop their idea, product or service. They will then present their results, prototypes or business models at the Digital Health Days conference on August 25-26 at the Stockholm Fair, says Nima Jokilaakso, Digital Health Days project coordinator.
 
During 48 hours on May16-18, researchers, patients and healthcare professionals will meet entrepreneurs, programming engineers, designers and business developers at the EIT ICT Labs Co-location Centre in Kista. The organisers of the Health Hack Academy are contributing with various areas of excellence, ensuring high quality of the outcome of the event.

- Our Co-location Centres are set up to be hotspots for integrating research, business and education, says Karoline Beronius, Co-location Centre Manager at EIT ICT Labs Stockholm. Our pan-European community of international companies, research institutes, startups and students are contributing to accelerate innovations, e.g in Health and Wellbeing as one strategic area with high social impact.

In order to make sure that the good ideas from the HHA can be implemented well in the real world the participants will get the opportunity to learn more about user-centric design at the workshop lead by Veryday, a leading design company with more than 40 years’ experience of design projects for the health sector.

- Our long experience within healthcare has taught us that uncovering deep insights about both patients and caregivers is key to innovation. But we’ve also learned that, given the opportunity to express themselves, people are incredibly creative and knowledgeable, says Lennart Andersson Director of Interaction Design, Design Strategist and Partner at Veryday,

The Stockholm Science City Foundation bring competence and contacts to the Academy as they are the collaboration hub in Stockholm for the universities, industry and healthcare representatives that aim at developing innovations, products and services that are both socially beneficial and profitable.

For more information, please contact:
Karoline Beronius, EIT ICT Labs, +46 (0)72 253 8206
Nima Jokilaakso, Stockholmsmässan, +46 (0)70-789 44 50
Lennart Andersson, Veryday, +46 (0)733-611 258
Paul Beatus, Stockholm Science City Foundation, +46 (0) 76-256 99 53
Susanne Fuglsang, Project leader of the Hackathon, +46 (0)70 738 99 97

About Health Hack Academy och Digital Health Days
Health Hack Academy is for both experienced hackers and those who have never participated in a hackathon. It’s a great place to meet future business partners, potential team members or mentors for your startup.

The event and environment will encourage people to learn, engage in conversations, share information and work with others to solve today’s health challenges in a hands-on way.
Participation is free of charge and we do not claim any stake in your future ideas or startups. HHA is a joint project organized by partners interested in developing the digital health care scene: Veryday, EIT ICT Labs, Stockholm Science City and Digital | Health Days.

More information about Health Hack Academy 2014 http://www.digitalhealthdays.se/hha
More information about Digital Health Days http://www.digitalhealthdays.se