As winter sets in here in DC, I’m warming up with memories of September’s Stanford Medicine X conference. I loved putting together a keynote that highlighted how the maker movement intersects with the e-patient movement — and how private sector and government leaders can benefit. This intersection, and the lessons we are learning from it, are the latest examples of how the internet gives us access not only to information but also to each other. That deceptively simple insight is, I believe, the key to unlocking the potential for innovation in health care.
Here’s an excerpt:
Stanford University posted the full video on their Facebook page and you can learn more about the Invent Health initiative I launched at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services by reading the following posts:
Health care needs a jolt of innovation. Here’s how we’re approaching it at HHS.
Invent Health: The National Week of Making
The Invent Health Initiative: Hardware Innovations for the Low-Resource Environment
Invent Health: Finding Common Ground
The Invent Health Initiative: Hardware Innovations Hard at Work
Invention and Innovation in Emergency Preparedness
Empowering Inventors to Create Tools for Better Living, Better Clinical Care
Thank you for all the amazing work you’ve done at the HHS.
Thanks, Ben!
It was truly an honor to shine a light on the innovative work going on inside HHS and all its divisions — who knew that CDC had a venture fund (and so does the HHS Secretary)? That HHS fields more prize competitions than most other agencies? That so many entrepreneurs wanted to take a chance and do a tour of duty inside FDA, CDC, CMS, ONC, and the Office for Civil Rights? And of course to bring my own brand of entrepreneurship — user-driven, PATIENT-driven, innovation — was an opportunity of a lifetime. I’ll be writing more about my experience in the coming weeks — stay tuned!