Are you a student, scientist, physician, entrepreneur or business owner with an innovation, invention or idea you think will change the world? Submit your idea to the Ignite to Innovate competition, a "Shark Tank"-style event to be held from 4 to 6 p.m. May 2 in the Scott Hall Cafeteria at the Wayne State University School of Medicine.
Submissions should be a 250-word essay or up to a three-minute video, and will be accepted through April 23. Email to ignitetoinnovate@gmail.com
Solutions should impact global/local health, health care access or decreased cost-of-care/economic models.
The competition is open to all, including all undergraduate and graduate students, faculty, residents, physicians and community partners, including those from WSU, as well as other schools and colleges throughout the state. Prizes include cash awards for the top two proposals and professional mentorship for the top three proposals.
"Ignite to Innovate" is part of the first "Global Health Innovation Week," presented April 30-May 4 by the Wayne State University Global Health Alliance, and an official event of the School of Medicine's 150th anniversary celebration.
"Innovators may get training for successful commercialization, and physicians may be able to use the innovations to help improve access to health care locally and globally," said WSUGHA board member Nitin Chouthai, M.B.B.S., a WSU associate professor of Pediatrics in the Division of Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine and the driving force behind the Ignite to Innovate competition.
"Most importantly, an innovation may trigger the economic engine for metropolitan Detroit for future economic recovery," he said.
The WSU Global Health Alliance trains leaders in global health who will set national and international standards of best practices in global and urban health education, service, research, policy and advocacy. WSUGHA serves to unify the various global health silos throughout the university to more efficiently and strategically leverage collective resources to collaborate on innovative interdisciplinary approaches that will drive transformative solutions to better impact health outcomes and reduce global mortality and morbidity. For more information on the organization, visit www.wsugha.org