UBC Students Showcase Innovation at The Great Hatch 2018

The Great Hatch expands the limits of technological innovation in healthcare by hardworking, compassionate, and inventive hatchers in a high-energy, 3-day, pitch style competition. With 92 participants, 27 mentors, 4 speakers, and 8 judges. participants brought expertise from diverse backgrounds, including engineering, data science, design, pharmacy, nursing, and medicine.

I caught up with University of British Columbia, UBC MD Candidate, Nancy Duan, sponsorship lead for the Hatching Heath event.

Marie: Nancy can you describe the event?
Nancy: Over 31 problems were pitched, and 14 interdisciplinary teams rose from the excitement to tackle real-life issues in healthcare. These projects ranged from devices that give patients more control over their own illnesses to improvements on existing equipment used in hospitals.
Friday night was an energetic and fun networking session where our participants and mentors were invited to meet each other and discuss ideas. We had inspiring speeches from our Gold Sponsor representatives: Dr. James Olson (UBC’s Faculty of Applied Science), Dr. Roger Wong (UBC’s Faculty of Medicine), and Kyle Brown (Joule).

Matthew Miller, a winner from last year’s Great Hatch who has continued to develop his team’s project (Coraluma, originally BeLeaf), also aroused great excitement and motivation for the hatch.

Marie: So after the fun and networking, did the work began early Saturday morning?
Nancy: From Saturday to Sunday morning, participants had 24 hours to develop and prototype solutions to their proposed problems. They were provided vast prototyping supplies which ranged from electronic equipment to art supplies. We also had an amazing and dedicated team from Spira3D, a local 3D printing services company, stay with us for the entire event to help teams with modeling and printing needs. Teams were additionally aided by 27 mentors from the engineering, design, and healthcare fields who helped them refine their projects. Participants worked hard late into the evening (some even staying overnight)!

Marie: Can you share the results?
Nancy: We were blown away Sunday afternoon as all 14 teams presented the solutions they hatched to two all-star, interdisciplinary panels of judges. It was a difficult decision to select the winners, but in the end we gave out one Great Hatch 2018 Grand Prize Award and three Gold Sponsor awards to very deserving teams.

• The Faculty of Applied Science Award for Best Innovation went to VitalEyes, a triaging tool for healthcare professionals in the Emergency Department that non-invasively monitors patient vitals.
• The Faculty of Medicine Catalyst Award for the most interdisciplinary team went to Flutter, a device that helps expecting mothers monitor fetal health.
• The Joule Healthcare Innovation Award for Biggest Potential Impact went to Dtech, which aimed to aid diabetic patients in early detection of diabetic neuropathy.
• The Great Hatch 2018 Grand Prize Award went to Lumina, a simple, low-cost mechanical improvement on tools used in central venous access to improve efficiency and reduce risk.

Marie: What are your future plans?
Nancy: We are incredibly proud of all the work done by our participants. Over the next year, we will be dedicated to further supporting them in implementing their ideas in every way possible. Resources that will be made available to participants include (but are not limited to) workshops to further develop ideas from all aspects, entrepreneurship/ incubator programs, access to opportunities for funding (i.e. our 3-Week Out event), access to professional consultants, facilities/ workspaces, mentorship, and networking. Our goal is to foster a sustainable, socially conscious community dedicated to improving health and wellness. You can visit our website for more information, photos and video.

SOLIDWORKS is a proud sponsor of The Great Hatch and supports academic product design Hatch events and hardware Hackathons. Apply for sponsorship here. Individual start-up companies can apply to the SOLIDWORKS for Entrepreneurs program here.

Thank you Nancy and the UBC Hatch teams for sharing with the SOLIDWORKS Community. Marie.

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Marie Planchard

Senior Director, Early Engagement, 3DEXPERIENCE Works at Dassault Systemes

Marie Planchard is an education and engineering advocate. As Senior Director of Education & Early Engagement, SOLIDWORKS, she is responsible for global development of content and social outreach for the 3DEXPERIENCE Works products across all levels of learning including educational institutions, Fab Labs, and entrepreneurship.