ONC names Code-a-Palooza, Digital Privacy Notice Challenge winners

A digital tool that enables patients and their families to use Medicare claims data to organize cost and other information to support healthcare decisions won first prize for the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT’s (ONC’s) Code-a-Palooza challenge at the 2014 Health Datapalooza in Washington, D.C.

The agency announced that the tool’s creator, Smart Health Hero by San Carlos, Calif.-based LufeChannel, beat out 55 proposals that all featured new visualization tools to help consumers use the 2012 Medicare Provider Payment data released by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. Second and third place winners were Accordion Health of Austin, Texas and karmadata of Hingham, Mass.

In addition, the ONC and the Office of Civil Rights named Portland, Ore.-based PatientPrivilege as the winner of the Digital Privacy Notice Challenge. Its website helps consumers integrate notices of privacy practices from their healthcare providers and health plans directly into their personal health records or into their providers’ portals. Second and third place winners were The Raj by Raj Arangarasan, PhD and the EXIT’s Health Privacy Notice Generator.

ONC also announced that 23 new federal and private partners have pledged to help promote Blue Button.