Through a whopping $15M grant from the Office of the National Coordinator for Health (ONC) in April 2010, researchers at Children’s and Harvard have developed a “first-of-its kind platform architecture to support a flexible health information technology environment and promote innovation.” Dubbed SMArt (Substitutable Medical Applications, reusable technologies), the platform — which aims to be the equivalent of an iTunes App Store for health — went public today and will be the foundation architecture for developers looking to win the competition.

According to competition organizers, apps should provide specific functionality and solve real problems for either patients, physicians, or more general public health — from patient medication management to e-prescription apps and in-office decision support for physicians.

The idea for SMArt architecture was described first in a March 2009 New England Journal of Medicine Perspectives article, as an ‘iPhone-like’ health IT platform model to facilitate the development of medical applications that are scalable, substitutable, and will drive improved health care through competition and innovation.

“The goal of this model is to enable a substantial shift towards technologies that are flexible and able to quickly adapt to meet the various needs of their users on a variety of devices,” said Kenneth Mandl, M.D., MPH, of the Children’s Hospital Informatics Program and Harvard Medical School, and co-lead on the SMArt project. “As developers begin to compete on quality, value and usability, we expect to see the introduction of an array of innovative functions and a drop in the cost of healthcare technology. Just as staple applications of the iPad, Android, and Blackberry platforms constantly evolve and compete to meet user demands, the SMArt platform will enable health IT to do the same.”

In August, Mandl along with Isaac Kohane, M.D., Ph.D of Harvard Medical School held a SMArt Developer Meeting with more than 60 representatives from academia, government, business, and technology alike. Multiple SMArt prototypes were presented, feedback was collected, and the team went quickly to work building the platform architecture and interface.

“There is an enormous talent pool available in our country’s developers and entrepreneurs to help drive new web and mobile health IT solutions that support health care functions,” said Kohane. “Through this competition we hope to excite this pool; to spark their imaginations and partner with them to move new ideas forward.”

Are you a developer interested in learning more about the SMArt project or participating in the app challenge to win $5,000? Submissions will be accepted through March 31, 2011. Visit www.smartplatforms.org/challenge for details and the development environment. Judges will review and announce winners in June 2011, including Susanna Fox, director of Health Research at the Pew Internet & American Life Project, Doug Solomon CTO at design consultancy IDEO, as well as professors from HBS, Yale and the University of Maryland.