DementiaHack Toronto 2015

  [go to hackernest.com/dementiahack for the full listing]  47 million people live with dementia worldwide – 750,000 in Canada alone – with global numbers expected to reach 75 million by 2030. Much effort goes towards the search for a cure that may be decades away, but millions today face overwhelming, heartbreaking challenges daily. The point of DementiaHack is to create products that improve lives today.   Saturday November 7 to Monday November 9, 2015   George Brown College Waterfront Campus | 51 Dockside Dr, Toronto, ON    Calling all developers, designers, health professionals, marketers, entrepreneurs, and others movivated by the cause:   Register ASAP so we can match you with mentors! Team matching Oct 3.   You want to win, right? Register and we’ll connect you with the best mentor/potential customer ever to give you relevant feedback on your ideas. Don’t wait. Schedules fill up fast.       Schedule   Sat, Oct 3: “Voices from the Field” Workshop @ MaRS, 101 College Street, Toronto Insustry experts, caregivers, and people living with dementia share insights and experiences so you get a better, more human understanding of their challenges. A very cool, very special guest may be video conferencing in. Casual socializing follows.   Mon, Oct 26: HackerNest Tech Social & DementiaHack Team Matching @ Entertech Systems, Suite 202, 109 Atlantic Avenue, Toronto Our regular Toronto Tech Social becomes a DementiaHack Team Matching event!    Sat, Nov 7-8: DementiaHack Hackathon @ George Brown College, Waterfront Campus, 51 Dockside Drive, Toronto Epic 30-hour hackathon culminating in a science-fair judging by mentors. Shortlisted teams will move on to the Monday night finals.    Mon, Nov 9: DementiaHack Finals @ George Brown College, Waterfront Campus Finalists get a day to recuperate and polish their demos. Potential investors, acquirers, and customers are invited to observe the crème de la crème of DementiaHack showcasing their products to our panel of distinguished judges. Casual socializing follows.       Prizes   GRAND PRIZE: Travel and accommodations for a UK business trip to pitch at a major health conference; intros to potential customers, investors, and acquirers galore. FACEBOOK PRIZE: Travel and accomodations for a trip to visit Faceboo in Silicon Valley.   CHALLENGE SET WINNERS (4): There will be cash, but we're designing prizing tracks to hel you get to market. We're working on securing legal/accounting/etc. partners and will update this section frequently.    Sponsors  DementiaHack is chaired by Jordan Banks, presented by Facebook, supported by the UK and Canadian governments, hosted at George Brown's new Waterfront Campus, and produced by HackerNest.     Support DementiaHack   We are actively seeking partners, challenge set champions, property sponsors, prize sponsors, and volunteers. To sponsor DementiaHack, please email dementiahack@hackernest.com. For press and media inquiries, please email esther.buchsbaum@energipr.com.   Challenge Sets   These are some of the most common and endemic challenges faced; solve them and you'll improve millions of lives. That said, these are suggestions, not restrictions: fit the theme, pick a beneficiary, come up with a working solution - and you'll get to demo.   Diagnosed individuals need help with: Cueing everyday tasks in a simple and sequential order Emergency broadcast alerting and notification systems for things like falls, extreme temperature changes, etc. Multisensory and cognitive brain stimulation and training to help keep people alert and perhaps active in the workforce longer   Family caregivers need help with: Easy management of knowledge and data reporting to healthcare professionals  Emergency alerting and notification systems within the household (e.g. notification when appliance is turned on, a shower runs for over an hour, etc.) Understanding where the person they’re caring for falls in the acute vs. chronic spectrum of dementia, what to expect, and finding support/best practices/coping strategies on how to manage   Institutional caregivers/clinicians need help with: Keeping up-to-date with the medication dispensing history/program in a multiple-caregiver-multiple-patient setting Tracking and monitoring movement of patients within a healthcare facility  Safely and comfortably preventing bedsores   Researchers need help with: Collecting and having access to ‘real-life’ cognitive and memory processing data Connecting to patients, family and institutional caregivers within the broader community Finding participants for studies/trials      Apply Now Apply early so we can partner you with a mentor sooner rather than later. Schedules fill up pretty fast. Don’t worry, the application is easy and straightforward: we just need a sense of what you’re working on so we can connect you with the best mentor… ever.   Rules   Demos must be functional demos: no slideshows/pure design mockups. Fresh code only. APIs and libraries are fine, but not if you wrote them... sneaky! Winners will likely be subjected to code review; Facebook engineers are pretty sharp. Teams can have up to 5 members. Have excellent personal hygiene. Don't be unpleasant. We reserve the right to eject anyone for violation of any of the rules above, especially #5. Just be sunshine and rainbows. Easy! Note: there will likely be media at all the events, so if you're not comfortable being on camera and having your likeness show up in noncommercial DementiaHack videos, wear a large hat. <3   Primer     We're bringing world-class developers, engineers, designers, health professionals, and other motivated individuals together November 7-9 to hack together new products/services for people living with dementia and their caregivers. DementiaHack is chaired by Jordan Banks, presented by Facebook, supported by the UK and Canadian governments, hosted at George Brown's new Waterfront Campus, and produced by HackerNest.   ‘Dementia’ describes various neurodegenerative conditions characterized by reduced cognitive function and memory loss. No treatment exists to cure or stop it. The World Health Organization estimates that 47+ million people live with dementia worldwide[1] (over 750,000 in Canada[2]), a number expected to increase to 75+ million by 2030. This poses a serious threat to the world’s economies as the funds needed to care for the growing population of those with dementia reaches epic proportions.   Significant effort and funding goes towards the search for a cure, but that may take years, even decades, to come to fruition. Dementia can be overwhelming; not only for those diagnosed, but also their families and caregivers. Today, millions of our rapidly aging populations and their loved ones face staggering, often heartbreaking challenges in their daily lives with dementia.   Our focus, however, isn’t pity: it’s practicality. We partnered with some of the world’s leading dementia experts[3] to distil relevant challenge sets to guide participants towards the most impactful outcomes. These are ordered by beneficiary to clearly answer the question: “Who am I helping?” – and will be featured in the most perfect environment for demonstrably effective innovations to emerge: DementiaHack.   Our mission isn’t just to raise awareness, it’s to enable the development of life-improving products that’ll make the world a little lighter for those affected by dementia -- today.  [1] who.int/features/factfiles/dementia/en/ [2] theglobeandmail.com/news/national/ambrose-provinces-to-come-together-to-develop-national-dementia-strategy/article20884846/  [3] Created in collaboration with the Public Health Agency of Canada, the Alzheimer’s Societies of Canada, Ontario and Toronto; Mount Sinai Hospital and its Cyril & Dorothy, Joel & Jill Reitman Centre for Alzheimer’s Support and Training; the Heart and Stroke Foundation; the University of Waterloo and its Murray Alzheimer Research and Education Program; the University of Toronto and its Tanz Centre for Research in Neurodegenerative Diseases; and Baycrest Health Sciences and its Centre for Geriatric Care   dementiahack@hackernest.com