Health challenge announces 7 projects winning $2M
Seven projects that harness the power of data and information for the health of communities will receive more than $2 million as winners of the Knight News Challenge: Health, according to an announcement made at the Clinton Health Matters conference in La Quinta, Calif.
The winners provide data-driven solutions to issues from prescription drug abuse and youth crisis counseling, to better medical resource allocation and connecting communities with local health services.
Launched in August, the challenge was a collaboration between Knight and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the California HealthCare Foundation, the Clinton Foundation and the Health Data Consortium. The Knight News Challenge: Health asked innovators to present solutions that harness the power of data and information for the health of communities, with a strong focus on civic participation and solution building.
The winning projects include the following:
Camden Health Explorer from Camden Coalition of Healthcare Providers: creating an interactive dashboard with real-time healthcare enrollment, cost and outcomes metrics to make the local healthcare system more efficient.
Crisis Text Line from DoSomething.org: providing youth with free crisis counseling via text messaging, including intervention and live referral services from trained counselors.
Homebrew Sensing Project from Public Laboratory: providing low-cost chemical analysis tools that allow residents to track hazardous chemicals in the environment and their health impacts.
Ohana API from Code for America: connecting the public with community resources through a centralized database that aggregates information on health, human and social services, so users can quickly access targeted information through search engines, smartphones or SMS.
Open Humans Network from PersonalGenomes.org: developing an online portal to connect people who are willing to share their personal health information with researchers to advance medical breakthroughs.
Positive Deviance Journalism from Solutions Journalism Network: collaborating with newsrooms and the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation to scan datasets for examples of positive health results that can lead to important stories.
SafeUseNow from Principled Strategies: using data to identify incidents of prescription drug abuse by tracking combinations of prescribers, patients and pharmacies that may be contributing to the problem.
Editor
Editor Beth earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism and master’s in health communication. She has worked in hospital, academic and publishing settings over the past 20 years. Beth joined TriMed in 2005, as editor of CMIO and Clinical Innovation + Technology. When not covering all things related to health IT, she spends time with her husband and three children.