The federal office overseeing the nation’s transition to electronic health records plans to award $5 million in prizes to spur innovation in health IT.
A new program launched by the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology will award $5 million in prizes to spur innovation in health IT through challenges.
Investing in Innovations or (i2) The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology will introduce up to 15 prize competitions each year until March 2013, according to ONC. For example, software developers could be asked to build new tools allowing for health care providers and patients to share information electronically or new applications allowing for patients to download their clinical information.
The program, called Investing in Innovations or (i2), is similar to efforts by other agencies such as NASA, which that use public competitions to increase citizen engagement and solve tough problems.
Under the 2010 America Competes Reauthorization Act of 2010, more agencies were given authority to host prize competitions.
A website launched by the General Services Administration in September — challenge.gov — allows agencies to populate the site with challenges offering monetary awards, blogs, and discussion boards and monetary awards. Nearly 100 challenges are posted on the site.
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EHR implementations face both high-tech and low-tech hurdles. http://www.healthcaretownhall.com/?p=3858