UCHealth to open collaborative innovation lab in Denver

UCHealth will bring its innovation team to the Catalyst Health-Tech Innovation (HTI) building in Denver, where doctors, nurses, IT developers and marketers will collaborate to change healthcare delivery.

UCHealth, a Colorado-based not-for-profit with 10 hospitals and 150 clinics, is one of more than 70 companies moving into the Catalyst HTI building. By working together in the same space, company leaders hope to foster partnership and collaboration.

"Healthcare is not going to be reimagined just through established healthcare organizations or startups," Catalyst HTI co-founder Mark Biselli said in a statement. "We have to do it together."

UCHealth will take up 17,500 square feet in the building, housing an innovation lab that will include a futuristic hospital room where researchers can test new equipment and tools.

UCHealth is not the first health system to take a collaborative approach to innovation. Health systems across the country, including Ochsner Health System in Louisiana and Henry Ford Health System in Michigan, run innovation centers.

But UCHealth's approach is somewhat unique, given the physical proximity of not-for-profit organizations with healthcare providers, payers and others in a single building.

"Our industry integrator concept allows UCHealth to be plugged in at the point of innovation by physically housing a healthcare innovation ecosystem in a single location," Biselli said in a statement.