Brain scans, glucometer data, images of clogged arteries and a living person. These are the materials that fifty IT and medical professional from around the world will tackle on the weekend of October 26-28. Registrations to the Smart Health Hackathon have opened on September 13th to both individuals and teams via the www.ceehacks.com website. When selected, candidates will have a chance to take part in the first Smart Health Hackathon in the Czech Republic and Central Europe. Within a 48 hour, non-stop weekend of innovation, they will take part in developing new solutions that will improve our hospitals, doctor visits, quality of life after injuries or help children through better rehabilitation. All of this will be supported by mentors such as surgeon Tomáš Šebek as well as Kateřina Vacková, a Harvard graduate and the founder of the Loono organization as well as the #prsakoule project. It will be further supported by Professor Štěpán Svačina, the president of the Czech Medical Association of J. E. Purkyně, who will be present at the event to assist all participants at the premises of the First Faculty of Medicine of Charles University in Prague. The winning team will take away 100,000 CZK and their idea will be implemented in practice.
Inspiration from the USA
“Some of the best ideas often originate from the outside. Not just from hospitals, pharmaceutical companies and research facilities but also from hackers for example. You put them together, closed for a period of two days, supply them with the data and offer them Wi-Fi, a 3D printer, pizza and voila, the idea is born. In the Czech medical environment, we need them like salt”explains the organizer of Smart Health Hackathon, Tomáš Studeník from the CEEHACKS organization. He also adds that the inspiration for this event came from a similar event titled Hacking Medicine which is organized by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Boston, USA. In the Central European region, an event in this format will be a first. “Much like our event spring which focused on urban mobility, this autumn medical Hackathon opens an opportunity for complex health topic to be presented to young people in a fun and competitive format” adds Studeník who is an expert on radical innovation.
Digiceutics: Even data can heal
Hackers which traditionally also include teams of children will compete in several categories. A live war veteran will be present and their goal will be to “hack” his war injury in order to improve his life. Teams will have access to data from examinations from diabetic patients, information from patients dependent on social networks, images of the brain from neurological research as well as data on pediatric rehabilitation “cages”. “Those could be improved greatly with the use of artificial intelligence and digitalization of the movements of the youngest patients in such a way that would allow the procedure to be more enjoyable and essentially, more effective” wishes MUDr. Jarmila Zipserová, a mentor and lead doctor of a rehabilitation clinic in Prague.
Participants can focus on apps and sensors which we already have in most modern smartphones and develop a new set of tools for the future of smart diagnostics. “This very topic belongs to the newest medical trends and a patients’ health state can be predicted using machine analysis of a large volume of gathered data. The data analysis alone offers greater effectiveness in monitoring patients’ treatment. Along with pharmaceuticals, digiceutics are on their way to becoming a tool for comprehensive assessments of the overall health state of a patient” explains Lucie Kvapilová, the product manager of CEAi. One of the keystone events of the programming marathon will be a world-first premiere of an orchestral composition by Varhan Orchestrovič Bauer based on the rhythms of the human body.
The jury decision and the announcement of the winner will take place on Sunday, October 28 at the premises of the First Faculty of Medicine of Charles University in Prague located at Kateřinská 32, Praha 2 at 14:00. It will be attended by the Minister of Health of the Czech Republic who together with the president of Czech Medical Association of J. E. Purkyně will hand out the main prize.
Hackathon will take place under the auspices of the Ministry of Health of the Czech Republic, the Czech Medical Association of J. E. Purkyně, the Czech Chamber of Commerce, the city of Prague and the Vysočina region. It is supported by the First Medical Faculty of Charles University, Czech Technical University in Prague, Loona, uLekare.cz, ŠKODA AUTO, DigiLab, ICZ, IBM Czech Republic and TESLA Medical.
What is a hackathon and how it works
A hackathon is a three day event within which programmers, innovators and medical professionals cooperate on solving problems from the medical and healthcare fields. The title is derived from the words hacker and marathon. CEEHACKS hackathons are among the most popular hackathons in the world. This can be seen in the selection of participants and mentors, as well as the amounts awarded to the participants. All of them are provided with refreshments and participants’ transport costs are covered as well. After 48 hours of intense work without sleep, the teams will present their solutions in front of a professional jury. The best ideas will be awarded and the teams will receive offers from the partners to introduce the ideas to the market and shine some light on it. The entire event is free of charge for the participants. They arrive with a sleeping mat, a sleeping bag and their own computer. They can leave the event as authors of an idea that will change the world.
