Members of the NIH and Suburban Hospital/Johns Hopkins University innovation team are shown with HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius at the HHSinnovates ceremony on Mar. 30. Included are (from l) James Anderson, David Zhang, Laura Lee, Chandra Kola, Ivor D’Souza, Cindy Notobartolo, Bill Corr (deputy secretary HHS), Sebelius, Wei Ma, Voula McDonough, Robert Rothstein, Donna Sasenick, Steven Phillips and Dwight Clarke.

Between now and Aug. 3, you can vote for the best ideas in round 5 of the HHSinnovates awards competition. Innovations from across HHS, including NIH, that improve the way we do business have been submitted and are now in the semi-final round of the competition. Based on votes cast by the HHS community, six innovations will be presented to Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who will select the top three for recognition at an awards ceremony in September.

In the previous round of HHSinnovates, your votes helped a team from NIH win the competition. The Patient Tracking and Locating System team and other finalists from across HHS were honored at an awards ceremony hosted by Sebelius on Mar. 30 and received a $2,500 cash prize.

To help hospitals manage high volumes of incoming patients in disaster situations, the National Library of Medicine, the Clinical Center, Suburban Hospital/ Johns Hopkins Medicine and Walter Reed National Military Medical Center worked together to develop and test a Patient Tracking and Locating System that can be made available to hospitals nationwide. The system empowers hospital emergency management staff with real-time information about incoming patient counts, severity status and location, ensuring that key staff have the information necessary to make timely decisions crucial to patient care.

You can cast your vote by clicking on the “Vote HHSinnovates” button at http://employees.nih.gov.

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