Cortex wins the New Zealand Health IT Solution Award

Cortex won the New Zealand Health IT Solution Award at the 2018 NZHIT Innovation Awards, presented at the HiNZ Conference in Wellington on 21 November.

The award, run by NZHIT, recognises the standout locally built health technology of the year. Cortex was chosen for what it had changed in daily clinical work at Canterbury, where clinicians, the health provider, and Sense Medical had built the platform together from an idea into everyday use across wards.

Cortex began as a clinician-led pilot at Christchurch Hospital and grew because the people using it shaped it, designing their own forms and workflows rather than adapting to someone else’s. The judges rewarded the result: a tool built with clinicians, not just for them.

“Winning shows the power of close collaboration between a health provider that supports innovation, clinicians and a vendor,” said Chris Rumball of Sense Medical.

Volpara Solutions took the companion International Health IT Solution Award the same evening, a reminder of how much health technology now comes out of New Zealand. Eight years on, the collaboration the award recognised has carried Cortex across Canterbury and the West Coast and into hospitals throughout the South Island.