In a cutting-edge collaboration with Veterans Health Administration’s Innovation Ecosystem, Microsoft and MIT Hacking Medicine, James A. Haley Veterans’ Hospital hosted the hackathon event,
Veterans Health – MIT Hacking Medicine 2024, from May 17-19 at the University of South Florida Morsani College of Medicine.
Hackathons bring together experts to rapidly design solutions to existing problems. The first of its kind event united top minds from VA, academia and public and private sectors to reimagine approaches to Veteran care. As described by event organizer JAHVH Chief of Innovation and Veterans Health- MIT Hacking Medicine Director Dr. Indra Sandal, “Veterans Health – MIT Hacking Medicine is powered by public-private collaboration, to create an ecosystem for people, technology and community stakeholders to deliver transformative health care innovations for Veterans.”
Highlighting the remarkable nature of the event, attendees included City of Tampa Mayor Jane Castor, Veteran Integrated Service Network 8 Director David Isaacks and JAHVH Executive Director David Dunning.
“Veterans’ Health – MIT Hacking Medicine is critical to helping improve care for Veterans,” said Isaacks. “It creates a connective tissue, utilizing Veterans Health Administration’s Innovation Ecosystem to bring together collaborators from various industries. This collaboration is a force multiplier for finding solutions and delivering on promises made to Veterans.”
Executive Director of VHA Innovation Ecosystem Kit Teague highlighted the importance of collaboration in addressing Veteran health needs.
“We need people from industry, academia, nonprofits, Veteran Service Organizations and entrepreneurs with new ideas and tools,” he said. “Hackathons are an essential tool to bring everybody together quickly. They connect people around a problem set, attract a community of solver, and form teams to tackle these problems head-on.”
Sandal connected her journey to the event’s mission, inspiring participants with the impact their solutions could have on Veterans.
“Growing up in India and being raised by a family that served in the military, I learned discipline, determination, and dedication early on, and the importance of military service, and the obligation that citizens have to honor and support those who serve our country,” she said. Her passion led her to VHA’s Innovation Ecosystem community, focusing on challenges Veterans face in accessing care.
“Three years ago, I looked to increase access to care for Veterans through the VHA-Uber Health Connect Initiative to help reduce missed appointments, improve the Veteran experience and achieve cost savings for VA facilities. Over the past three years, our program has brought 50,000 Veterans to medical appointments and saved VA $200 million in travel costs. On May 1st, this program became available across all VA medical centers.”
Harnessing Technology to Advance Veteran Care
Leveraging the power of advanced technology, participants collaborated to design solutions to critical Veteran health care challenges. With a growing Veteran population that has unique needs, diverse approaches to improving health care delivery, enhancing patient experiences and ultimately saving lives are essential.
“This has not been done anywhere else, and it’s been a long time since I’ve seen a crowd this big,” said JAHVH’s Executive Director David Dunning. “Innovation is progress, but it’s revolutionary progress. Innovation must change our viewpoint. We must look at the process and make the outcome better.”
Resources like Artificial Intelligence have the potential to significantly advance health care for Veterans. Managing Director of Tampa Bay Wave Dr. Richard Munassi said, “We’re at an interesting inflection point right now when it comes to both health care and technology. Every year, our patient population ages more, and there’s more critical need for infrastructure, technology and operational workflows than ever before. I know that the solutions coming out of here today could be saving the lives of our Veterans now, and into the future.”
During the Hackathon, teams harnessed generative-AI tools and utilized de-identified VA data to address three VA health care priorities:
- Connect Veterans to the soonest and best care.
- Prevent Veteran suicide (Mental Health).
- Hire faster and more competitively.
“We have well over 20,000 Veterans in the City of Tampa, and that’s not counting the entire Tampa Bay area,” said Castor. “The three areas the hackers are here to address are critically important to creating innovative solutions that will not only impact our Veterans, but everyone in the U.S.”
Collaboration Drives Groundbreaking Solutions
Divided into teams, innovators, scientists, doctors, nurses, engineers, researchers, UX and CX designers and health care futurists collaborated under the guidance of industry leaders and subject matter experts. This mentorship fostered an exchange of ideas and the creation of groundbreaking solutions that will benefit Veterans and their caregivers for generations. The event brought together participants from 28 states.
Associate Dean at USF Charles Brock commented, “This opportunity to work in collaboration gives all of our health care workers the opportunity to understand the uniqueness, but also the shared nature, of caring for Veterans.”
The 217 participants formed 41 teams to solve problems within VHA’s top priority challenges of bringing the soonest and best care to Veterans, preventing Veteran suicide and hiring faster and more competitively. The teams were guided by over 50 mentors and judges from senior VHA leadership, industry experts and academic specialists.
“This was such a great opportunity to network with individuals from so many different backgrounds and experiences,” said Dave Beck, a quality management specialist from Team Tampa. “I would encourage anyone who wants to make a difference improving the services we provide to Veterans to attend future hackathons.”
Teams drew inspiration from keynote speakers and panels discussing topics such as “Public-Private Collaboration in Health Care Innovation” and “From 0-1: Early-Stage Entrepreneurship.” Winning teams from the three categories will advance to a Makeathon, where they will transform their ideas from the concept stage to creating a working prototype.
“Public-private collaboration, like what we’re seeing at the Veterans Health MIT Hacking Medicine event, is crucial,” said General Manager of the federal civilian arm of Microsoft Dan Coleman of the collaboration. “It allows us to leverage the strengths of multiple sectors to advance health care for Veterans. The VA MIT Hacking Medicine event is next tier.”
For participants, the hackathon symbolized the inaugural stride of a transformative industry movement.
The average rating from the 93 attendees who filled out the feedback form was 8.9 out of 10. Remarkably, 92 out of 93 participants indicated they would potentially participate in another health care hackathon.
As attendees and mentors bid farewell, their parting hugs and cheers resonated with a sense of collective achievement. The Hackathon not only forged new relationships but also ignited a shared vision for a future that seamlessly integrates evolving health care demands with cutting-edge technology, all in service of America’s heroes.
“If you want to do something with innovation, remember one thing,” Sandal. “Dream big. No idea is too small, and nothing is impossible.”
2024 Veterans Health – MIT Hacking Medicine Winners, Runners-Up
Provide Veterans the Soonest and Best Care
- AI Reconciliation Rangers (Team 106): Improved the medication reconciliation process with an AI-powered solution, medsafely.com, with one team member from Team Tampa.
- ContrastAssist (Team 112): Streamlined contrast-enhanced CT scan orders through automated approval.
- The Optimizers (Team 107): Addressed ineffective scheduling and provider matching by developing an AI algorithm for automated triage and scheduling, with three team members from Team Tampa.
Prevent Veteran Suicide (Mental Health)
- VITAE (Team 208): Transformed static Safety Plans into dynamic, Veteran-centric decision points using humanized conversations.
- GuardianAssist (Team 201): Developed a multi-modal AI analysis to help non-mental health staff engage in critical suicide prevention conversations.
- Hidden Truths (Team 204): Created an early suicide risk detection tool using machine learning with voice biomarkers and clinical decision support with two team members from Team Tampa.
Hire Faster and More Competitively
- VA Match (Team 309): Accelerated hiring by using GenAI and NLP to rate and rank resumes, reducing bias and improving consistency.
- The HireForce Squad (Team 306): Implemented the VA Resume Compatibility Checker to score resumes with AI based on position selection history with three team members from Team Tampa.
- AIhR (Team 307): Enhanced candidate evaluation efficiency with an AI model to streamline the hiring process.
For more information about Veterans Health Administration’s Innovation Ecosystem, visit: https://www.innovation.va.gov/ecosystem/views/home.html
For more information about MIT Hacking Medicine, visit: https://www.hackingmedicine.mit.edu/
For more information about University of South Florida Health Morsani College of Medicine, visit: https://health.usf.edu/medicine/
For more information about VISN 8, visit: https://www.visn8.va.gov/
For more information on the VHA-Uber Health Connect Initiative, visit: https://news.va.gov/122430/vha-uber-health-connect-veterans-transportat…
For more information about Tampa Bay Wave, visit: https://www.tampabaywave.org/
To see full article view here: https://www.va.gov/tampa-health-care/stories/veterans-health-mit-hacking-medicine-2024-transformative-innovation-through-public-private-partnership/
