InnoCentive and The Economist Announce the Winner of the Healthcare Information Economy Challenge

InnoCentive is now part of Wazoku

Waltham, Mass.—June 3, 2011—InnoCentive Inc., the global leader in Challenge Driven Innovation, along with The Economist, today announced the winner of The Economist-InnoCentive Healthcare Information Economy Challenge. Daniel Castro, a senior analyst at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF), a non-profit think tank based in Washington D.C., will be awarded $10,000 and an opportunity to present his solution at the upcoming Ideas Economy: Information event on June 7th in Santa Clara. The Challenge, which attracted nearly 1,000 Solvers and received more than 125 submissions on the InnoCentive website, asked participants to provide a business model that would enable a future healthcare information economy in which private health data could benefit healthcare research, lower costs, and ultimately improve patient care.

The winning solution promotes health record data banks (HRDBs), comprehensive data libraries of a patient’s medical records. HRDBs would allow patients or their health insurers to pay a small fee in order for medical data to be stored, maintained and managed. HRDBs would then pay healthcare providers a transaction fee for every “deposit” of information following a healthcare experience. With HRDBs, patients would be free to select the company they believe provides the best quality, value, privacy and security. HRDBs would compete for customers by developing innovative tools and applications, allowing patients to better manage their personal health information. The creation of HRDBs would enable legislation to motivate or require patients to share their aggregate data to allow for the creation of a national healthcare research network.

“Less than three months after we launched the Healthcare Information Economy Challenge, we’ve uncovered a smart idea that could have a dramatic impact on the future of healthcare,” said Vijay Vaitheeswaran, global correspondent for The Economist. “In an industry that so greatly affects the global economy, it’s vital that we embrace new ideas and creative new applications of old ideas.”

“This Challenge called for a solution which created market-based incentives to aggregate healthcare data,” said Dwayne Spradlin, CEO of InnoCentive. “With the ability to collect and analyze healthcare data in aggregate form, health insurers and researchers alike can utilize the rich information available to further health outcomes while protecting the privacy and security of individual patient data. Daniel’s solution is a great example of how to harness the knowledge of healthcare experiences to advance healthcare research and improve the quality of care for patients.”

The winner was selected by an expert panel including Michael Driscoll, Founder of Dataspora; Todd Park, CTO of United States Department of Health and Human Services; and Andrew Thompson, CEO of Proteus Biomedical. Mr. Castro will present his solution at The Economist’s upcoming Ideas Economy: Information event taking place June 7th and 8th in Santa Clara, CA.

The Healthcare Information Economy Challenge is one of a series of Challenges presented jointly by InnoCentive and The Economist as part of The Economist’s Ideas Economy event series. Currently, Solvers can participate in The Economist-InnoCentive Human Potential Index Challenge (https://www.innocentive.com/ar/challenge/9932801), which is seeking concepts for novel and useful metrics or indices that quantify important trends affecting humanity. The winner of this Challenge will receive up to $10,000 and be elevated to the position of speaker or participant at the September 2011 Ideas Economy: Human Potential conference in New York City.

For more information on InnoCentive, visit the company’s website at www.innocentive.com.

About InnoCentive
 

InnoCentive is the global leader in Challenge Driven Innovation that bridges the gap between great ideas and actual solutions to drive measurable results. Recognized as an open innovation and crowdsourcing pioneer, InnoCentive’s proven methodology, expanding global community of millions of problem Solvers, and cloud-based technology platform enable organizations to tap all potential sources of innovation – employees, customers, partners, and the world’s largest Solver community – to accelerate their pace of innovation and evolve into true Challenge Driven Enterprises. Leading commercial, public sector, and nonprofit organizations such as Eli Lilly, Life Technologies, NASA, nature.com, Popular Science, Procter & Gamble, Roche, Rockefeller Foundation, and The Economist partner with InnoCentive to help them solve their most pressing problems and challenges. For more information, visit www.innocentive.com.

About The Economist (www.economist.com)
 

With a growing global circulation (worldwide: 1,473,939; North America: 833,667) and a reputation for insightful analysis and opinion on every aspect of world events, The Economist is one of the most widely recognized and well-read current affairs publications. The paper has sections about each region of the world, plus science and technology, books and arts, and the weekly obituary. The website (www.economist.com), with its 5.9m unique readers, is also accessible through devices including the iPhone and iPad.