A HealthTech Hackathon organised in Moldova

For the first time, the State University of Medicine and Pharmacy “Nicolae Testemitanu” (www.usmf.md) in partnership with and StartUp Moldova (https://startupmoldova.digital/en/), with the support of USAID and Government of Sweden organized a healthtech hackathon, looking for solutions to the challenges faced by patients with chronic medical conditions.

More than 80 participants, young entrepreneurs and innovators attended the event, generating relevant ideas for real-life data collection, nutrition, improving patient’s compliance with the disease management plan, real-time health monitoring and remote care, empowering patients in using new digital solutions, smart apps for mental health and well-being in the remote work era, among others. Mentors from the academic and private sectors supported the teams throughout the project creation process, coaching and advising them.

After three days of intense collaboration, ten teams presented their concepts to a mixed jury comprised of experts from various related fields of endeavor, three of them being selected to participate in a three-month acceleration program, to further develop the digital solutions designed during the Hackathon’s initial round: CorlabTech, a startup that offered a digital application for investigating and evaluating Parkinson’s illness, KeepMyChildSafe presented a design of an application that would allow for the monitoring of children under the age of five, while HeroDoc proposed a solution for online primary doctors’ consultations.

As a result of the acceleration program, during a HealthTech Demo Day, the winning startup – HeroDoc was awarded with a $5,000 prize.