Games4Health Challenge

October 6, 2016

The Games4Health Challenge, created and run by the Sorenson Center for Discovery & Innovation at the Univeristy of Utah, is the largest games design challenge in the world focused on health and wellbeing. In 2016, we had 400 students from 71 universities, 12 countries and 125 teams compete for $60,000 in prize money evaluated by 80 judges.
Registration for 2017 Games4Health Challenge will open up next week, and we invite all your undergraduate and graduate students to register to compete. 

We offer 20 cash prizes of nearly $60,000 in total across six primary categories. 

Last year, UofU students won over $20,000 in prize money. 

The following is a list of the challenge categories. 

Corporate Wellness Challenge

Over 60% of all employers provide wellness programs for the employees to help promote health behaviors that lead to create creativity, productivity and wellbeing. Yet many of these programs fail to achieve the adoption necessary for success because they are boring and lack the gamification necessary for sustainable engagement. Students participating in this challenge will design and create games that address this market need.

Adolescent Mental Wellbeing Challenge

By the time someone graduates from high school they will have spent 10,000 hours in school and 10,000 hours playing video games. Parents are concerned that such a huge investment in game play does not improve the mental, emotional and physical wellbeing of their children. How can existing games be modified to promote positive psychological emotions and behaviors that lead to healthier and happier adolescents? Students participating in this challenge could also design and create modules for existing games like Mine Craft that address this need.

Happy Fitness Challenge

Research indicates that increasing physical activity and performing it on a consistent basis is the most effective therapy for most disease including mental health and is the most reliable way to increase your happiness. Yet too few people are engaged in such activity and have begun to seek new digital health technologies to make fitness fun and engaging. Students competing in this challenge will be designing and creating apps and games that increase engagement in fitness.

Chronic Disease Challenge

Two-thirds of all healthcare costs are associated with chronic disease. Two-thirds of all Americans are overweight or obese, a comorbid condition that increases the risk and complications associated with diabetes, asthma, cardiovascular disease, mental illness, and other similar disease. Students in this challenge will be adding the gaming mechanics and principles to the experience of managing chronic disease to help people achieve better health outcomes at substantially lower costs.

Clinical Health Challenge

Doctors, nurses and other healthcare professionals have begun to embrace the use of various digital technologies in the practice of medicine. By so doing they can deliver novel and high value-added experience to patients that deliver digital experience in the clinical and non-clinical environments to achieve the triple-aim of healthcare: affordable services with ubiquitous access, and high quality. Here students will design and create apps and games that enable the same type of digital experience in healthcare that consumers experience in all other aspects of their lives.

Virtual Reality Challenge
Challenge Awards
VR is being applied to many different healthcare applications to increase engagement and change behaviors to improve health. Students are encouraged to apply VR technology to any of the five sponsored challenges. All VR entries will then be eligible to compete in both their chosen challenge category as well as in this VR challenge.

Chris Wasden, EdD
Executive Director & Professor of Innovation
Sorenson Center for Discovery & Innovation
David Eccles School of Business
University of Utah
@chriswasden