A national ideathon competition launched by AGE-WELL and HACKING HEALTH will take place in five Canadian cities in 2017. The goal is to identify and invest in great new technologies and services to support healthy aging.

Prizes awarded at the AGE-WELL–HACKING HEALTH National Ideathon will total $75,000 in cash and in-kind services.

Local ideathons are being held in: Toronto (Feb. 3), Montreal (Mar. 3), Halifax (May 13) and Vancouver (date to follow). One winning project from each local event will be eligible for the final round at the AGE-WELL 2017 Annual Conference in Winnipeg on Oct. 17-19, 2017.

People interested in taking part can sign up here. Eligibility criteria and competition rules and regulations are posted on the competition main page.

An ideathon is a collaborative, workshop-like event where diverse stakeholders harness their collective knowledge and creativity to brainstorm innovative solutions to pressing challenges. Participants use user-centric design techniques and methodologies (such as ideation, journey mapping and prototyping), and the creation of an initial business case, to propose a novel solution.

"AGE-WELL and HACKING HEALTH share an interest in bringing people together to develop creative solutions to health-related challenges," says Dr. Alex Mihailidis, Scientific Director, AGE-WELL. "By partnering to host this competition, we will trigger more innovation and much-needed solutions to support the independence, health and quality of life of older people, and to support  their caregivers."

Luc Sirois, Managing Director and Co-Founder of HACKING HEALTH, a global initiative, says the partnership and competition will help to bring together tech and medical communities and "catalyze the innovation spirit."

Generous sponsors of the national competition are: Bereskin & Parr, the Impact Centre, and Aging2.0 Toronto.

About AGE-WELL

AGE-WELL NCE Inc. (http://www.agewell-nce.ca/, @AGEWELL_NCE) is a pan-Canadian network of industry, non-profit organizations, government, care providers, end users, and academic partners working to drive innovation and create technologies and services that benefit older adults and caregivers. Its vision is to harness and build upon the potential of emerging and advanced technologies in areas such as artificial intelligence (AI), e-health, information communication technologies (ICTs), and mobile technologies to stimulate technological, social, and policy innovation. AGE-WELL was launched in 2015 through the federally funded Networks of Centres of Excellence program.

About HACKING HEALTH 

HACKING HEALTH (http://hackinghealth.ca, @hackinghealthca) is a Canadian-based international non-for-profit organization. With over 40 cities across 5 continents, HACKING HEALTH's goal is to promote more innovation in healthcare through collaboration by putting healthcare professionals and patients at the centre of the innovation process, allowing participants to build realistic, human-centric solutions to front-line healthcare problems. HACKING HEALTH partners with renowned organizations and institutions such as AGE-WELL to develop a worldwide patient centered movement.