Until recently, developing health technologies was time-consuming and expensive, and often involved patients, doctors, and other healthcare professionals only as passive recipients of the end product. So far, users have been minimally involved in the ideation and creation stages of digital health technologies. In order to best address users’ unmet needs, a transdisciplinary and user-led approach, involving co-creation and direct user feedback, is required. In this context, hackathon events have become increasingly popular in generating enthusiasm for user-centered innovation. And Grant Government Medical College and Sir J.J Group of Hospitals, Mumbai being an epitome of inventions and innovations may it be the discovery of plague vaccine in 1896 by Sir V.M. Haffkine/Waldemar Haffkine in the F.D. Petit Laboratory of G.M.C. (which is today occupied by the Pharmacology Department) and Robert Koch’s work on Vibrio Cholerae which was done in two rooms of the old animal house behind the coroner’s court to name a few!
Thus we hosted a Medical Device Hackathon (MEDHA) 2023 in association with Betic Labs, IIT Bombay. MEDHA is a hackathon for students and working professionals to explore medical device innovation. The aim of this event was to solve unmet clinical needs in order to strengthen the Healthcare system through interdisciplinary collaborations. The event was conducted from 26th May to 28th May 2023. It was one of the first kind of events that was organized at the institute and M.I.C.E Labs being a part of the organizing team was the real feather in our cap. In promoting the event, the general concept of hackathons was explained as an “open transdisciplinary workshop,” since many potential participants—especially from the medical sector—were still unfamiliar with the term hackathon.
The event was graced by the Honorable Commissioner- MEDD (Medical Education and Drugs Department) Mr. Rajeev Nivatkar sir, Honorable Joint Director- DMER (Directorate of Medical Education and Research Maharashtra) Dr Ajay Chandanwale sir, Dean of Grant Government Medical College & Sir J.J Group of Hospitals, Mumbai Dr. Pallavi Saple ma’am, Dr. Anjali Malpani ma’am- IVF specialist and Philanthropist for M.I.C.E Labs, and Dr. Aniruddha Malpani sir- IVF specialist and Philanthropist for M.I.C.E Labs.
DAY 1:
We began our journey with the Inauguration ceremony on Day 1. It was conducted at Medical Innovation Creativity and Entrepreneurship (M.I.C.E) Labs and Medical Education Unit (MEU) with all the esteemed guests. Post-inauguration, there was a visit by the Commissioner sir at M.I.C.E Labs. We started our icebreaker activity in which delegates got to know about each other and started networking. Once the ice-breaking activities were over, we started showcasing the videos of the unmet clinical need statement provided by the clinicians. After multidisciplinary team formation, project ideas were discussed in brainstorming sessions within the teams, often involving various ideation techniques. Below are the problem statements put forward. Out of this, the first 6 problem statements were selected by 6 teams respectively. Exchange of expertise and assistance was encouraged between teams.
DAY 2:
Day 2 began with a hospital tour where delegates were shown various departments of Sir J.J Hospital, Mumbai. They gained insights and ground-level reality after talking to doctors, nurses, and other staff of the hospital. This helped them in concreting their problem statement and also in thinking of more solutions for this. During this phase, mentors with medical and engineering expertise were recruited to explore the pain point and solution approach in relation to several healthcare actors (eg, physicians, nurses, or patients). Afterward, participants carried on with their work and explored solution approaches with the support of information technology and design-focused mentors. As a result of this iterative process, the teams developed prototypes demonstrating their ideas and solutions and by the end of the day, all the delegates submitted their work.
DAY 3:
Day 3 was full of excitement as we had the final pitch day with our esteemed interdisciplinary jury panel. Dr. Supriya Bhondve from Dept of Surgery at GGMC & Sir J.J Hospital Mumbai, Ms. Mena Malgaonkar- Faculty and Freelance designer at Ecole Intuit, Lower Parel, Mr. Dhruv Sane- CA at Malpani Ventures and Dr. Sheetal Mapare- Assistant Professor at Vidyalankar Institute of Technology, Wadala. Each team was given 7 mins of presentation, followed by 5 mins of Q & A by the judges.
The jury criteria included the following:
- Innovation potential and feasibility of the idea.
- Execution of the idea at the hackathon.
- Multidisciplinary composition of the team.
- Design and user experience of the prototype.
- Presentation of the project.
After the final verdict, Team Raksha (Problem statement related to stoma) won the first prize, followed by Team Anumaan (Problem statement related to the quantification of Neurological examination) bagged the runner’s up. Instead of awarding monetary prizes, the winning team delegates were given a DIY Drone kit by the M.I.C.E Labs team as a token of appreciation for their hard work. Further, the winning team and the runner-up team will present their work at Betic Labs, IIT Bombay in Stage 2 on 10th June 2023 in the form of a presentation and poster preservation respectively.