• Solutions have been based on 5G and extended reality (XR) to reduce the negative impact of long hospitalizations for adolescents aged 12 to 17 years.
• Both projects will be implemented in real hospital settings in Barcelona and Boston over the next year
• The international hackathon has been organized by MWCapital, Sant Joan de Déu Barcelona Hospital, Boston Children’s Hospital and Garage Stories, and has had the collaboration of Cisco, IBM, GSMA, CaixaBank, Barcelona Tech City, MedVR, 5G Barcelona, the Barcelona City Council and the Generalitat de Catalunya

Projects Boost Board and Squishy are the winners of “Hack the Hospital – 5G Transatlantic Lab 2.021”, the first hackathon organized between Barcelona and Boston that took place last weekend intending to design new innovative solutions that improve the stay of adolescents in hospitals.

The hackathon, promoted by Mobile World Capital Barcelona, ​​Hospital Sant Joan de Déu Barcelona, ​​Boston Children’s Hospital and Garage Stories, has also had the support of Cisco, IBM, GSMA, CaixaBank, Barcelona Tech City, MedVR, 5G Barcelona, the Barcelona City Council and the Generalitat de Catalunya.

Boost Board aims at encouraging social interactions in hospitals to improve the mood of patients. To solve the issue of reduced mobility and/or the risk of contagion, the solution uses augmented reality to allow patients to exchange interactive messages and generate leisure spaces through co-creation with their roommates. The contents of the prototype of the project will be designed in collaboration with real patients.

As for Squishy, ​​it wants to help patients get on with life outside of the hospital. Through a 360 camera -thanks to sensors that allow to detection and transmit emotions; the patient’s family and friends will be able to create experiences in real-time so that the patient can experience first-hand some of the situations they miss the most, such as a family meal or an outing with friends to the beach.

Both projects have been chosen by an international jury among the different solutions presented during the hackathon and will be tested at the Hospital Sant Joan de Déu Barcelona and Boston Children’s Hospital in collaboration with their innovation teams.

A hackathon to improve teenage long hospitalizations

During the weekend, more than 200 participants have been able to develop their projects framed in five verticals (socialization, mental health, education, entertainment and family experience) with the aim of reducing the negative impact that the experience of a long hospitalization has on paediatric patients and their families. These projects, focused on patients between the ages of 12 and 17, have used 5G technology and extended reality as the basis for creating innovative solutions that use digitization to improve people’s lives.

Teamwork has been the protagonist these two days, where they have received the help of real patients from the two hospitals, mentors and international speakers. In fact, during the two weeks before the hackathon, a program of activities specially designed for the participants has been carried out with internationally renowned experts in research, innovation and technology topics such as Big Data, yachting or XR. Among them, the presence of Google, Walt Disney Studios or researchers from centres such as MIT in Boston, Harvard or NYU (New York University) stands out.