SupplyLyft / UberSupply

Traceable, Price-safe Method to Speed Company and Community Provided Medical Supplies to Health Care Facilities

Comment 1

Inspiration

From the news and my personal contacts in the health I hear of the extreme shortages of PPEs and ventilators in hospitals, urgent care centers and other health facilities. I have seen first hand and in reading that people want to get their excess supplies to hospitals Therefore I wanted to find a way to connect the equipment with the places needed, while providing some employment for out of work employees. I also want to safeguard against theft and price gouging.

  • An article that I can no longer find, which stated that large amounts of PPEs can be found on the shelves of businesses through the United States - stockpiled for other possible events, but not currently being used. It just needs to get into the hands of those who need it now.
  • My office had three boxes of N95 masks in case of more California wildfires. Our office manager walked them over to a nearby hospital that was so grateful for any donation.
  • A Nextdoor.com post in my neighborhood: a person who had just one box of N95 mask also for wildfire preparation was looking to donate, and at least 10 healthcare works wanted to come pick it up to take to their place of work.

I'm focusing on mid to large sized companies donations / sales first.

What it does

The app matches healthcare facilities in need of PPEs and ventilators with organizations that have medium to large amounts of PPEs and ventilators within a reasonable driving distance. The organizations choose to donate, sell, or, in the case of ventilators, loan, the equipment to the medical facilities. Once matched, the app calls Lyft or Uber to enable the transfer of the supplies. To manage theft, Lyft/Uber can confirm that their drivers indeed arrive at the intended location. On each end, the organization, the Lyft/Uber driver and the medical facility all check the count of the supplies matches the expected.

The medical facilities would pay a set, standard price (determined per country) for any equipment received if the organizations want to sell it. The medical facilities would also pay for the Lyft or Uber fees. Contracts for loans and return dates should also be included.

Lyft and Uber could use drivers who are under-employment and/or who are not comfortable driving people in this time of social distancing. Additionally, they can hire drivers with trucks to facilitate transfers. These types of drivers have not traditionally been employed by Lyft and Uber and could provide an employment opportunity for people out of work.

How I built it

Thought through many objections / problems with the idea, such as how to prevent theft and price gouging.

I built mockups with FluidUI to show each pertinent step in the process

Challenges I ran into

  • The algorithm to match donors/sellers with health care facilities needs to be improved to decide which facility to match with. In addition to closest location, amount of need listed, size of the facility, and recent donations/sales would be important. Other factors such as number of COVID-19 cases or number of tests performed could be include to determine size of need. Feedback from healthcare facilities would be helpful
  • Without a 501 3C organization to back this, donations cannot be tax deductible in the US. I would like them to be.
  • Loan contracts and Payment processing are not something I'm very familiar with

Accomplishments that I'm proud of

  • Finding a way to help both health care facilities and under/un-employed people

What I learned

What's next for SupplyLyft / UberSupply

Develop the app one of these ways:

  • Research Lyft and Uber APIs
  • Reach out to Lyft and Uber directly to see if they are interested in building this together and/or participating.
  • Reach out to ProjectN95 if they want to consider organizations with extra equipment as suppliers
  • An extension for a small business that had to close: to open in a community as a donation aggregator.

Built With

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