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CMS Artificial Intelligence Health Outcomes Challenge

CMS Artificial Intelligence Health Outcomes Challenge

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Artificial Intelligence Health Outcomes Challenge is a three-stage competition to accelerate artificial intelligence solutions to better predict health outcomes such as unplanned hospital and skilled nursing facility admissions and adverse events for potential use by the Innovation Center in testing innovative payment and service delivery models under the authority of section 1115A of the Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. 1315a). CMS is partnering with the American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP) and the Laura and John Arnold Foundation to award up to $1.65 million to selected participants during the three stages of the Challenge.

The Goals of the Challenge - The CMS Artificial Intelligence Health Outcomes Challenge is an opportunity for innovators to demonstrate how artificial intelligence tools, such as deep learning and neural networks, can be used to predict unplanned hospital and skilled nursing facility admissions and adverse events for potential use by the Innovation Center in testing innovative payment and service delivery models under the authority of section 1115A of the Social Security Act. The Challenge prioritizes explainable artificial intelligence solutions to help front-line clinicians understand and trust artificial intelligence-driven data feedback to target scarce resources and improve the quality of care.  

The Challenge Structure - The Challenge consists of three stages. 

  • During the Launch Stage, participants will submit an application via ai.cms.gov and provide information about their proposed solution. Up to 20 participants will be selected to advance to Stage 1.

  • During Stage 1, participants will design and test their proposed solution using certain Medicare claims data sets. Up to five participants will be selected to advance to Stage 2 and will each be awarded up to $80,000. 

  • During Stage 2, finalists will be able to request additional Medicare claims data and refine their solutions. The grand prize winner in Stage 2 will be awarded up to $1 million and the runner up will be awarded up to $250,000.

Challenge Timing - The Challenge will run for approximately one year.  The Launch Stage will run from March 2019 through June 2019.  Stage 1 will run from summer 2019 – fall 2019.  Stage 2 will run from winter 2019 through spring 2020 and the winner will be announced in April 2020.  (Dates are subject to change.)

For More information - Learn more about the CMS Artificial Intelligence Health Outcomes Challenge at ai.cms.gov. To read the official public announcement for the Challenge, visit go.cms.gov/AI.