Innovating for Healthcare

1.5 units

In this entrepreneurial course, students form teams and work on solving real problems facing the healthcare industry by producing solution prototypes that may also be commercialized by the students once the class is completed. The majority of the course work involves weekly customer interviews and team presentations on those findings. Using Lean Startup Theory, this course will provide an entrepreneurial platform that can develop solution prototypes that match the healthcare industry users' needs in just weeks, rather than months or years. Depending on the industry, grants or investors may provide follow-on funding to student teams for further refinement and development of solution prototypes. The course is demanding. Students will present at every class, work closely with their team, and receive relentlessly direct feedback. Problem sponsors, mentors, industry liaisons, corporate partners, investors, and journalists may be in the room while students are solving real problems for real customers in real time. This is a course designed for all graduate students and upper-level undergraduates in all Washington University schools and programs. It takes an entrepreneurial, interdisciplinary approach to the healthcare industry's biggest challenges. It is assumed that students will come into the course with a basic understanding of ideation, research methods, corporate entities, funding sources, intellectual property, and so on.