Mental Health Global Data Challenge

As part of Wellcome's ambition to create a world where no one is held back by mental health problem we are seeking to help  unleash the power of population data. This includes supporting work to find new insights from existing data as well as funding collection of new data

To make best use of existing data means bringing diverse skills and perspectives to bear. One way we are advancing this agenda is to launch Wellcome's first Global Health Data Challenge. This is a collaboration between those of us working on mental health and those working on data for science and health across Wellcome.

The first step is to find a partner organisation to help us finalise the scope of the challenge and to then run the challenge. You can find more information in our request for proposals 

The deadline for expressions of interest is November 18th

Once the partner organisation is selected we will work closely with them to launch the Mental Health Data Challenge in 2021. The challenge will use mental health data originating from UK’s data ecosystem; and, if relevant datasets can be sourced by the supplier, at least one additional location from the global south. 

What is a Data Challenge?

Data challenges are innovative ways to try to bring together talents, approaches and experiences from a variety of problem solvers in an effective and different way of achieving results - using a "prize" approach. 

Some examples of data challenges from outside mental health are given below- with thanks to my wonderful colleague Ekin Bolukbasi who shared these examples and is leading this challenge.

•  Grand Challenges Brazil by the Gates Foundation brought expertise in data science, epidemiology and public health together to identify new approaches for maternal and child health with solutions including tools for spatial analysis of childhood vaccination and data-driven risk stratification for pre-term birth, all of which would have been impossible without input from problem solvers with different expertise.
•  Fighting Ebola Grand Challenge by the USAID had a broad and ambitious starting question (ideas that deliver practical and cost-effective innovations for Ebola outbreak in a matter of months) and has awarded a range of solutions from re-engineered health care worker suits, to developing open source mobile platforms for outbreak management. 
•  Malaria dream challenge was more specific, both in its starting question and target innovation, and aimed to tackle the resistance to the anti-malarial drug Artemisinin by developing new computational models.  

Wellcome's Mental Health Data Challenge

This data challenge sets out to generate tools and/or methods to enable better understanding of active ingredients that make mental health interventions and approaches effective against anxiety and depression in young people.

The aim of the challenge is to incentivise a diverse set of people to come together, such as: data scientists and data engineers, clinicians and healthcare providers, biomedical researchers, those with lived experience of mental health problems, policy and decision maker. The hope is that the challenge will help them collaborate to find best ways of using data relevant to depression and anxiety in young people in diverse global locations and, crucially lead to data-driven tools and/or methods which may help inform more effective approaches to youth anxiety and depression. 

If you think you could be the right supplier to work with us on this project please do submit an expression of interest by the 18th November.