In the midst of a global pandemic, diagnostic results from COVID-19 testing are crucial for decision-making at all levels, from school boards and doctors to employers and local government officials.
However, diagnostic devices particularly from rapid at-home, over-the-counter testing and COVID-19 test results have not yet been paired with digital software tools to easily transmit the information.
Through a product development cycle called a “sprint”, 12 technology teams created digital products to transmit COVID-19 diagnostics data efficiently, securely, and accurately.
To focus on this national challenge, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), in partnership with the U.S. Census Bureau, facilitated a COVID-19 TOPx tech sprint to help develop innovative digital solutions for data capture, harmonization and reporting from COVID-19 tests.
Through a product development cycle called a “sprint”, 12 technology teams created digital products to transmit COVID-19 diagnostics data efficiently, securely, and accurately.
The goal is to provide key stakeholders — including federal, state, local and tribal governments, patients, healthcare providers, employers, schools and consumers — easy access to diagnostic data.
Participating teams were selected from the HHS COVID-19 At-Anywhere Diagnostics Design-a-thon, an open innovation technology design sprint open to the public.
Nearly 1,000 participants from government, industry, academia, and non-profit organizations worked to develop digital health tools to automatically capture and wirelessly transmit data from at-anywhere COVID-19 diagnostic tests.
TOPx is modeled on The Opportunity Project (TOP), which brings together technology experts, government officials, and communities to rapidly generate and prototype digital products — powered by federal open data — that solve real-world problems for communities across the country.
TOPx Toolkit provides an adaptable resource for federal agencies, developed by the Census Bureau’s Census Open Innovation Labs (COIL), that enables federal agencies to conduct their own virtual technology development sprints to address key national challenges.
A traditional TOP sprint focuses on challenges identified by multiple federal agencies and facilitated by COIL. In contrast, a TOPx sprint allows federal agencies to use the TOP model on their own, using the TOPx playbook.
Agencies can follow a step-by-step guide and run sprints on their own to engage the public, industry, academia, civic and social sectors in creating data-driven solutions with real-world impact.
For the HHS and Census Bureau effort, teams were asked to focus on helping:
Here are some examples:
These technology products are a small sample of the dozens of tools that have been created through this intersection of federal agencies, technologists, non-profits and advocacy voices from communities that are most impacted by these national challenges.
Learn more about these and other products on May 25 at the upcoming COVID-19 TOPx Virtual Solutions Showcase Day.
To date, more than 1,500 individuals, 30 federal agencies, and hundreds of organizations have participated in TOP, leading to 135 new open data tools including apps, websites, mapping tools, data visualizations, games, and more.
Now, with the TOPx and Product Development toolkits, the TOP model can be used by any organization or individual to develop data-driven technology and elevate community voices in response to some of our country’s most pressing challenges.
Join us May 25 as we showcase these amazing tools virtually on Zoom. RSVP at TOPx HHS Showcase.
Sign up for emails to stay in the loop and learn more about upcoming sprints in 2021. Questions? Contact Census Open Innovation Labs.
Haley Ashcom Miller is the lead communications strategist for Census Open Innovation Labs (COIL).
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The U.S. Census Bureau is the leading source of statistical information about the nation’s people. Our population statistics come from decennial censuses, which count the entire U.S. population every ten years, along with several other surveys.
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