By Kristen Honey, PhD, PMP, Chief Data Scientist, Executive Director of InnovationX, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health, HHS and Michael Iademarco, MD, MPH, Rear Admiral and Assistant Surgeon General, United States Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Science and Medicine, OASH, HHS
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HHS’ HealthData.gov fuels new business models, scientific advancements, and collaborative innovation by making government data open to the public, easily discoverable, and machine readable. This month, the HealthData.gov team curated datasets and resources related to a major priority—health equity—and asked:
How can we transform raw data into actionable insights and digital tools to bridge disparities of health, including those exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, and to ensure equitable access and wellness for all?
This question underlies the Health Equity DataJam, run by AcademyHealth, which is collaborating with HHS to build health-equity momentum prior to the 2022 Health Datapalooza and National Health Policy Conference on April 4–5, 2022. Simply, a DataJam is a technical convening where people collaboratively solve a problem with data, which often results in useful products, such as visualizations, reusable applications, and answers. This Health Equity DataJam is a call-to-action for diverse problem solvers from all walks of life. AcademyHealth launched the Health Equity DataJam on March 11, 2022, and is accepting proposed solutions and ideas through March 28, 2022. They’ll announce winners at this year’s Health Datapalooza.
To encourage civic tech and public engagement, the HealthData.gov team organized information by health equity topics. We encourage everyone to browse these topics and discover issue-specific ideas, curated datasets, and resources to get started. Add your data skills, innovation, and expertise to help tackle the nation’s biggest challenges, including but not limited to:
- COVID-19 and Equity: How can we transform raw data into actionable COVID-19 insights, digital tools, or other innovations to improve outcomes and ameliorate disparities worsened by the pandemic?
- Lyme Innovation and Health Equity: How can we address Lyme disease, and improve health equity for all tick-borne diseases, using emerging technologies that couple the power of the crowd and patient insights with data?
- Kidney Care and Health Equity: How can we transform raw data into actionable insights and digital tools to bridge disparities of health related to kidney care, including prevention and issues exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, and to ensure equitable access and wellness for all?
- Access to Care: How can we harness the power of data and digital innovation to lower barriers, facilitate access to care, and improve government services?
- Other Health Equity: Whatever most interests you!
The Health Equity DataJam is open to entrepreneurs, researchers, technologists, and anyone who wants to make a difference using open data to help solve national health equity issues. All ideas are welcome!
Data sharing and collaboration are happening at a faster pace than ever before. This acceleration provides an increased opportunity to fast-track equitable solutions and bridge disparities of health.
We encourage you to use government data and the newly curated HealthData.gov resources on health equity to build the next generation of health-tech solutions with, by, and for the people. Open data for good—join us!
For more information, you can visit Healthdata.gov.
This article was originally published on HHS blog and is republished here with permission.