Nation's first ever Hacking Medicaid Event to be held in Colorado Springs

Hackathon: "Hacking Medicaid" Friday, October 23—Saturday, October 24 Hotel Elegante, 2886 S. Circle Drive, Colorado Springs, CO.

Health care leaders, entrepreneurs, engineers, programmers and forward thinkers are invited to attend the nation's first ever "Hacking Medicaid" Hackathon on October 23—24^th in Colorado Springs. The cost is $75 and participants can register online at www.hackingmedicaid.org. The Hacking Medicaid Event is modeled after the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's (MIT) Hacking Medicine Program and a team from MIT will help facilitate the event. The event includes prize $ up to $10,000 to fund a pilot of the winning concept.

Community Health Partnership (CHP), which operates Community Care of Central Colorado, a Regional Care Collaborative Organization (RCCO) for Medicaid members in Colorado Springs, is pioneering the effort to bring innovation and transformation to Medicaid delivery.

"This event is designed to bring creative minds together both inside and outside the health care field to find innovative solutions around some of the complex challenges with the current Medicaid system," Dr. Joel Dickerman, DO, Chief Medical Officer at Community Health Partnership, said.

MIT's Hacking Medicine program is a student-led organization that is developing solutions to some of medicine's toughest problems.

The challenges this event plans to hack are tied to three main areas related to those receiving Medicaid: Patient engagement, Care coordination and Behavioral health and integrated care. More than one million Coloradans and more than 71 million individuals nationwide are enrolled in Medicaid, which is the primary health insurance program for those with low incomes.

Understanding "Hackathons"

A hackathon is an event, often spanning a period of days, in which a diverse group of individuals (clinicians, entrepreneurs, engineers, programmers) come together to solve a complex problem, usually under a general theme. The hackathon meeting format is high-energy and solution-driven. It came from the technology industry and has been adapted for health care by the team at Massachusetts Institute of Technology's (MIT) Hacking Medicaid program, which has led more than three dozen events worldwide.

The health care hackathon takes participants through a brainstorming process and facilitates the formation of small teams. The teams work together during the event to innovate solutions to health care's toughest challenges. At the end of the event, teams will present their solutions to participants and a panel of judges and will compete for prize money plus potential opportunities to pilot their concepts.

The Hacking Medicaid Event, which is open to the public, will bring together some of the brightest minds in medicine along with business people, entrepreneurs, engineers, social workers, patients, students, techies and innovators from around Colorado and across the county.