The Merck Heritage Provider Network Innovation Challenge Posts a $240,000 Purse

By Gregg A. Masters, MPH

I received the following heads-up via email from former Senior Adviser to CTO Todd Park, now Health IT & Data Partnerships, Business Development, and Strategy at @Merck Aman Bhandari aka @GHIdeas on Sunday morning and wanted to make the challenge known to the innovation community especially those in hacking away at the triple aim via ACOs or accountable care derivatives. 

Innovation absent relevance to move the needle towards the triple aim whether at the business model, platform or app level is hardly innovation worthy incentivizing via challenges. Here we have an example of innovation that can matter of interest to any entity or enterprise managing risk and/or quality at the population level.

In the ’80/20 rule’ towards the drill down into where the greatest return can be realized via care management or adherence innovation, the focus is rightfully placed on the pandemic of diabetes with an annual total spend of $245 billion, heart disease $108 billion and the to be realized contribution from the digital health economy in the real world of healthcare operations.

The details of the challenge are as follows:

The Merck | Heritage Provider Network Innovation Challenge calls on entrepreneurs, data scientists, designers, healthcare providers, and big thinkers to create the products or services that will support patients with diabetes and/or heart disease in adhering to their care plans.

For people living with these chronic diseases, a care plan maps out critical recommendations around healthy behaviors, medication management, and nutrition. At the same time, the care plan can feel like a daunting regime with unattainable goals.

Submitted concepts should focus on human-centric opportunities to achieve health and wellness, draw on rich data sets to understand real-life behaviors of patients, and leverage the patient ecosystem to create novel methods for personalized support.

• 5 Finalists get $20,000 and a 3 day intensive design, business modeling and prototyping bootcamp
• 2 Finalists gets another $20,000 to potentially run a mini pilot with Heritage
• 1 Finalist gets $100,000 to take the prototype and turn it into a real life solution

To enter the challenge, click here.

Thanks to Aman for the heads up!