Dr. Peter Rubin Receives Pittsburgh Health Data Alliance Project Funding

In an effort to solve some of healthcare’s toughest challenges through the innovative use of technology, the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) Enterprises announced recently that it will fund several projects created under the umbrella of the Pittsburgh Health Data Alliance. Announced in March 2015, the Pittsburgh Health Data Alliance is a unique collaboration among UPMC, the University of Pittsburgh, and Carnegie Mellon University. It will focus on building new companies that create data-intensive software and services, with the potential to revolutionize health care and wellness.

Through Pitt’s Center for Commercial Applications of Healthcare Data, McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine faculty member J. Peter Rubin, MD, Chair of the Department of Plastic Surgery, UPMC Endowed Professor of Plastic Surgery, and Professor of Bioengineering at the University of Pittsburgh, will receive funding for his project entitled PUMP. This effort affords a solution aimed at reducing hospital-acquired pressure ulcers, affecting an estimated 3 million patients annually. The monitoring and alert solutions, using wearable devices and hospital bed sensors, will provide real-time documentation of patient repositioning and a process to improve compliance with these preventative measures.

“We are excited to move forward with the first of many exceptional ideas in the Health Data Alliance pipeline,” said Tal Heppenstall, president of UPMC Enterprises. “This promising start bodes well for the Alliance’s goal of transforming health care by unleashing the creativity and entrepreneurialism of leading scientists and clinicians in Pittsburgh.”