Hack4Health: Build­ing the Future of Health­care in a Week­end

Can a great inno­va­tion in health­care be cre­at­ed in just 54 hours?

While many would hes­i­tate to say ‘yes’ – or per­haps not even con­sid­er doing so –, a group of 41 peo­ple came togeth­er at the OYS­TER Incu­ba­tor premis­es to chal­lenge this ini­tial per­cep­tion.

Hack4Health Oulu is a high-ener­gy week­end tech jam where teams col­lab­o­rate to solve real-world health & well-being chal­lenges brought by OSYTER’s part­ners. With access to expert men­tor­ing and sup­port from a cre­ative com­mu­ni­ty, teams turn ideas into advanced pro­to­types, fresh con­cepts, and inno­v­a­tive solu­tions.

This year, the hackathon took place between the 4^th and the 6^th of April, bring­ing togeth­er stu­dents, researchers, and pro­fes­sion­als in var­i­ous fields, from med­i­cine to ICT to busi­ness devel­op­ment. The for­mat was fast-paced and immer­sive: 54 hours of ideation, work­shops, pro­to­typ­ing, and men­tor­ing, with par­tic­i­pants grouped into 11 teams.

Spon­sored by POLAR, the event gave teams access to real, func­tion­ing wear­able devices, enabling them to rapid­ly test and refine their ideas. The week­end cul­mi­nat­ed in a high-stakes pitch­ing com­pe­ti­tion, where each team had just three min­utes to present their solu­tion, fol­lowed by a two-minute Q&A from the judges. Along with the top 3, one team was crowned with the “best pitch” award.

Among the stand­out teams was the one that secured first place with their con­cept: an AI-pow­ered well­ness com­pan­ion that inte­grates bio-sig­nals from POLAR devices and user-pro­vid­ed health records to deliv­er per­son­al­ized, explain­able health insights. Designed to help indi­vid­u­als man­age stress and mon­i­tor over­all well-being, the tool allows indi­vid­u­als to receive tai­lored lifestyle guid­ance based on their unique phys­i­ol­o­gy and health risks.

“We took on the chal­lenge pre­sent­ed by Polar, Remote Patient Mon­i­tor­ing, with a mis­sion to improve health­care access,” says team mem­ber Gun­jan Chan­dra, whose back­ground in pre­ci­sion med­i­cine and explain­able AI at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Oulu helped shape the foun­da­tion of their solu­tion. “By har­ness­ing elec­tron­ic health records (EHRs), bio-sig­nals, and even syn­thet­ic data, I aim to mod­el the intri­cate real­i­ties of real-world patients and enhance the accu­ra­cy and trans­paren­cy of out­come pre­dic­tions,” she explains.

The hackathon became an oppor­tu­ni­ty to take that research out of the lab. “That’s what brought me to Hack4Health with a clear inten­tion: to move this research out of the lab and into real lives”, Chan­dra adds.

Team­work and Growth

Work­ing with­in a tight time­frame, the team had to bridge dif­fer­ences in exper­tise and pro­fes­sion­al vocab­u­lary. “From the begin­ning, we were four indi­vid­u­als with com­plete­ly dif­fer­ent pro­fes­sion­al back­grounds, which nat­u­ral­ly led to some com­mu­ni­ca­tion chal­lenges,” said Kanel­la Mag­dali­ni Chas­apa­ki. “Each of us spoke our own ‘pro­fes­sion­al lan­guage,’ and that occa­sion­al­ly made it hard to ful­ly under­stand one anoth­er. Time was also a major obsta­cle: we had just 54 hours to bring our idea to life.”

But being a mul­ti­dis­ci­pli­nary team turned out to be one of their great­est strengths. “Our diver­si­ty worked in our favour. It made divid­ing the tasks eas­i­er and helped us avoid over­lap­ping respon­si­bil­i­ties”, Chas­apa­ki notes. “Because every­one brought their own exper­tise to the table, our deci­sions were more informed and bal­anced.”

Par­tic­i­pat­ing in Hack4Health chal­lenged the team to grow beyond their usu­al bound­aries. “It pushed me beyond my com­fort zone and exposed me to new ideas and skills”, says Chas­apa­ki. “Col­lab­o­rat­ing with pro­fes­sion­als from dif­fer­ent fields improved both my flex­i­bil­i­ty and my abil­i­ty to com­mu­ni­cate effec­tive­ly in a team set­ting.”

Michał Kowal­s­ki, the team’s tech spe­cial­ist, echoes that sen­ti­ment. “It was def­i­nite­ly a dif­fer­ent expe­ri­ence from what I’m used to. Nor­mal­ly, I work with oth­er engi­neer­ing stu­dents, so our approach to prob­lems tends to be more tech­ni­cal. This time, though, I got to look at things from a more con­cep­tu­al and busi­ness side, which was inter­est­ing.”

Dur­ing the event, Kowal­s­ki also worked close­ly with POLAR devices, and even went beyond his own team to help oth­ers. “That expe­ri­ence went real­ly well. I was even asked to assist oth­er teams with their inte­gra­tions and had the oppor­tu­ni­ty to write a report for Polar Elec­tro about my work.”

What is next

As for what’s next, the team isn’t slow­ing down. “While we have an ambi­tious long-term vision for the project, right now we’re focus­ing on plan­ning, prepa­ra­tion, and find­ing the right investors and part­ners”, says Kowal­s­ki. He also expressed a per­son­al inter­est in con­tin­u­ing to col­lab­o­rate with Polar. “I’m hope­ful that in the future, I’ll be able to con­tribute to and grow with Polar Elec­tro, either through this project or direct­ly as part of the team.”

Chan­dra also shared some plans for the future: “I’ve been active­ly build­ing the core team and meet­ing with poten­tial can­di­dates to sup­port prod­uct devel­op­ment. Addi­tion­al­ly, we will soon be meet­ing with Polar to explore col­lab­o­ra­tion oppor­tu­ni­ties”, she explains. “On the fund­ing front, I’ve been in dis­cus­sions with investors to secure sup­port for the start­up, and we are plan­ning to apply for pub­lic fund­ing for proof-of-con­cept.”

In just one week­end, the team turned years of research and exper­tise into a work­ing pro­to­type with the poten­tial to make health­care more per­son­al­ized and proac­tive. Hack4Health may only last 54 hours, but for some teams, it can be the begin­ning of some­thing much big­ger.

About OYS­TER

The OYS­TER Incu­ba­tor, launched in Fall 2024, is a dynam­ic start­up hub oper­at­ed by OuluHealth stake­hold­ers. By pro­vid­ing tai­lored men­tor­ship and robust net­work­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties, the OYS­TER Incu­ba­tor accel­er­ates mar­ket entry for inno­va­tions and bridges the gap between break­through research and real-world health­care impact.

Text: Beat­riz Rocha, Health and Life Sci­ence, Busi­nes­sOulu
Images: © Riik­ka Savela