Hacking women's health: A new methodology

Abstract

The paper describes an innovative methodological approach to Public Engagement already tested by the Authors in the healthcare context. We propose to apply our methodology to social innovation projects, focusing on gender perspective when promoting enhancements in health-community. Methodology mixes Psychosocial Participatory Research, Service-Design and "Human-Centered" approach, promoting an interdisciplinary, technological, and sustainable process. The final aim is to find viable solutions to real problems through the engagement of a community of experts and citizens in a three-step process. Awareness-raising actions: to increase people's knowledge-group understanding of the subject and to stimulate reflection. Activities: Gender-Cafés, Ethnographic-Observations and Narrative-Interviews. Activation actions: group interventions in which initial stimuli are collected and processed into proposals for services and tools aimed at targeted groups. Activities: Barcamps, Generative Labs. Participation actions: multidisciplinary teams realize prototypes and elaborate concrete solutions (tools, services) addressing crucial gender issues. Activities: Hackathon, Service-Design-Labs.

Keywords: Women; health; public engagement.