It’s often been said that health systems have to “look outside the box” to see the latest in mHealth innovation. But there are some pretty good ideas inside that box, too.
“This is where the really great ideas come from,” says Ward Detwiler, project manager for the Henry Ford Innovation Institute, part of Detroit’s Henry Ford Health System. “After all, they’re working in this (environment) every day.”
The four-year-old institute, which exists as a part of the Henry Ford Health System campus but maintains a separate identity from the healthcare side of things, is one of a number of innovation labs springing up around the country. Forward-thinking systems like Intermountain Health in Salt Lake City, Boston’s Partners HealthCare and Boston Children’s Hospital and UPMC in Pittsburgh have had these centers up and running for years, drawing inspiration and ideas from the clinicians that work there. Now other hospitals and health networks are using that blueprint.
Detwiler, who has a background in startups, said Henry Ford looked at what Intermountain and others were doing before establishing its own center. He noted that some of the more enterprising, clinically-focused mHealth apps were coming from doctors and nurses looking to improve upon processes they use every day, and those apps were being developed and tested in laboratories right next to the hospitals that would someday use them.
Want to publish your own articles on DistilINFO Publications?
Send us an email, we will get in touch with you.
“What we’re all trying to do is be proactive and find a better solution,” he said. “We wanted to create a separate place (from the hospital) where you could come and explore your ideas. … It’s a safe place to be experimental.”
Detwiler pointed out that “the large majority of ideas don’t work out,” but the center’s goal is to find that diamond in the rough. And when one idea does work out, gets developed and tested and then used in the health system, it can potentially be introduced to a much larger and more lucrative market.
“We can commercialize the intellectual assets of our clinicians,” he pointed out. And that not only helps the healthcare industry as a whole, but gives the health system a little ROI on the side.
Detwiler said HFII saw great success with one of its first projects – a partnership with a nearby college for creative studies to redesign the typical patient gown, making it more appealing and functional. As a result, the hospital will be getting some 30,000 new gowns next month. Two projects in pilot phase this winter are Virtual Nurse, an avatar-based women’s health education program for post-discharge patients, and Stat Chat, a patient-centered communication system.
In addition, he said, HFII is in talks with two companies about partnerships in mHealth projects.
Then there are the challenges. The system hosted the Health Tech Challenge and “Digital Solutions to Avoidable Readmissions” Challenge, both in 2013, and this year introduced the Davidson Digital Health Challenge: Clinical Applications of Wearable Sensor Technology. All are designed to bring out the creative talents of clinicians and community members alike to, as Detwiler puts it, “find digital solutions to real missions.” Aside from a cash award, the winners are offered a 50 percent share of any revenues if the product makes it to market.
The last challenge produced a first-, second- and third-place winner, along with two other finalists, all of whom will be using the innovation lab to move from concept to reality. The winning concepts involve using wearable sensors to improve mobility in acute care patients, monitoring and improving recovery time for patients with total hip replacements, and monitoring and alerting clinicians to instances of nocturnal hypoglycemia.
Henry Ford Health System officials say their goal is to create a culture of creativity among those who best know the problems facing healthcare.
“The most important word is ‘yes,'” said Nancy Schlichting, the health system’s CEO, in a recent Forbes storyon the innovation center. “It is difficult to create a culture of innovation. If you shut down one person, you shut down everyone, because bad news travels fast. When it comes to innovation, my mantra is yes.'”
“If innovation isn’t in our DNA, how can we organize and take advantage of it?” added Henry Ford’s president and COO, Robert Riney, in the story. “That’s why we started (HFII) … we have put in place a system that has demystified the innovation process in our workforce.”
Detwiler said the innovation center will hopefully draw out more ideas from clinicians who see issues that can or should be addressed.
“Hopefully,” he said, “we’re creating a population of doctors and nurses who are trained to think this way.”
Date: December 16, 2014