Health x Design Winners
Honorable Mention
Leveraging the health system to address malnutrition
Innovating for Impact: Better Food for Seniors
Contributors:
Denise C. Tahara, Xue Bai, Mary McBride, Kavita Ahluwalia
Project Overview
Denise C. Tahara, MBA, PhD, Xue Bai, MPS, Mary McBride, PhD, and Kavita Ahluwalia, DDS, MPH, designed Better Food for Seniors, an integrated medical, social, and public health solution providing nutrient-rich foods for malnourished seniors. Their proposal leverages existing technologies and systems, such as electronic health records and electronic benefit transfer (EBT) cards, in order to improve access, availability, utilization, and sustainability of feeding systems for seniors. This team was awarded for recognizing the systemic nature of the complex social challenges that we face as we try to improve access to nutritious food.
Prize Winner 1
Address a target behavior at the systems level
Culdesac is a community-based urban midrise apartment living concept. Culdesac uses people-centered design and technology to promote a living experience that facilitates quality social connection and combats loneliness, contributing to overall health and wellbeing.
See ProjectPrize Winner 2
Reimagine a system or space
Smooth Commuting is a plan to redesign the Boston commuter rail system in order to mitigate the negative health effects of long, unpleasant commutes.
See ProjectHonorable Mentions

Leveraging the health system to address malnutrition
Innovating for Impact:
Better Food for Seniors
Better Food for Seniors is an integrated medical, social, and public health solution providing nutrient-rich foods for malnourished seniors.

Promoting sonic health
MorrowSound:
Sonic Health
Sonic Health, developed by MorrowSound, proposes the use of environmental sound design in order to benefit people biologically and psychologically by improving the native audio ecology of shared spaces.