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.