The American Medical Association (AMA) has partnered with Google to launch a contest that challenges the startup community to come up with a solution that allows patients and clinicians to share patient-generated data.
The “Health Care Interoperability and Innovation Challenge,” sponsored by Google, calls on participants to transfer data captured by wearables or mobile apps “into one or more phases of clinical care” that can be “transformed into accessible and actionable information for the patient and physician to improve health outcomes,” according to an announcement.
Specifically, the AMA wants to see solutions that can help assess current conditions, develop treatment plans, record outcomes or prompt clinicians to intervene when necessary. Entrants are also asked to transfer data from the clinical care environment back to a mobile device or application.
Google's primary role in the challenge is a sponsor, according to AMA spokesperson Robert Mills, who added that a Google executive will serve as one of the judges.
The three winners will be named on June 7 and share $50,000 in credits for Google Cloud.
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The challenge builds on AMA’s Integrated Health Model Initiative, launched late last year, that brings together healthcare providers and technology companies to create a common framework for organizing health data. Some of the partnering organizations include Intermountain Healthcare, Cerner, IBM and the American Academy of Family Physicians.
“The Challenge we’re announcing today is an extension of the AMA’s work and will explore possible uses of mobile health technology to provide patients and physicians with a rich stream of medical data that is important for improving care and long-term wellness,” AMA President David Barbe, M.D., said in a statement.
AMA has taken on a bigger role in advancing digital health over the last several years since CEO James Madara famously issued a word of caution about “digital snake oil.” Over the past year, AMA has joined the Humana Diagnosis Project and pushed doctors to get more involved in the development of new mobile health apps.
During a speech at the group’s Interim Meeting in November, Madara said providers need to be able to decipher a flood of health data.
“Currently, we confront oceans of data, but only puddles of clinical meaning,” he said.