Welcoming the Winners of the Global Health Case Challenge 2016 on Antimicrobial Resistance

On 24th November we had the pleasure to meet the winner team of the “Global Health Case Challenge 2016 on Antibiotic Resistance”. This initiative results from the collaboration between the World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe, the EIT Health Campus programme, and the University of Copenhagen.

During the day, the Antimicrobial Resistance Initiative (AMR Initivative) at ISGlobal organized a joint seminar together with the Master of Global Health (ISGlobal) focused on the global impact of antimicrobial resistance in health and actions needed to tackle this problem.

After a seminar presented by Dr. Jordi Vila, director of the AMR Initiative, and an interactive quiz conducted by Clara Ballesté, coordinator of the AMR Initiative, the Danish students had the opportunity to interact and discuss their idea with the audience, followed by a visit to our laboratories at ISGlobal.

On 17-18 November, the five of them worked hard during 24 hours to present an innovative and viable cross-disciplinary solution to the WHO Europe Case Challenge: Find the answer to one of the world’s main health challenges, the fight against antibiotic resistance. The students of the Technical University of Copenhagen/University of Copenhagen and the Copenhagen Business School presented an A.I. computing service that compares symptoms with big data such as epidemiological data, infections and clinical data.

“Ideally, the project will directly lead to a reduction in unnecessary antibiotic prescription, especially as we believe that GP's will be more inclined to utilise POCTs currently available on the market.”

–Troels Rømer (Medicine, UCPH)

“In the longer run, the ability to live-track disease patterns and thus react more quickly would certainly be an added potential benefit. The ultimate goal is naturally to significantly reduce AMR.”

–Mark Khurana (Medicine, UCPH)

“Pinpointing our exact contributions to the project is difficult; we work tremendously well as a team, and the constant dialogue within the group was key to creating a cogent concept.”

–Johan Bundgaard (Medicine, UCPH)

“We firmly believe that the idea is feasible; in fact, we think this type of technology/concept is an inevitable development within the healthcare sector. The technology required is largely available, but it will require a bit of innovation to use the tech practically to fulfil our idea.”

–Jakob Simonsen (Medicine & Technology, UCPH)

“We're confident that we can realize the potential of the project, especially with proper planning: researching what GPs need, sorting out data security, creating a usable interface, etc.”

–Kasper Djernåæs (Int. Business & Politics, CBS)