A public service initiative

Hack the Cure

Free, open-source tools for patients navigating clinical trials. Because finding a treatment that could save your life shouldn't require a medical degree.

Find Clinical Trials on curemap.org →
Why this exists

The personal connection

In 2011, Bill Heyman was diagnosed with Stage IV melanoma and given 9–12 months. The treatment that saved his life was an experimental immunotherapy trial at the National Institutes of Health — a trial he found through desperate searching, a connected oncologist, and luck.

The experience revealed a truth that hasn't changed: the system connecting patients to potentially life-saving treatments is broken. Not medically — the science is extraordinary. The interface is what's broken.

ClinicalTrials.gov, the authoritative registry of 500,000+ studies, was built for researchers filing regulatory paperwork. Not for the patient who just received a diagnosis and needs to understand their options now.

Hack the Cure exists because navigating your own survival shouldn't require a medical degree.

Mission

Patient-first. Always.

Make the tools of clinical trial navigation free, open, and accessible to every patient — regardless of medical literacy, technical ability, or financial resources.

  • Plain language — Medical jargon translated to everyday English. Always.
  • Free forever — A public service, not a business. No paywalls, no premium tiers.
  • Open source — The code, the data pipeline, the algorithms. All of it.
  • No bias — All trials, all sponsors. No preferential ranking. No conflicts of interest.
  • Patient-first — Every decision starts with: what does the person who just got a diagnosis need?
Flagship tool

CureMap

A better way for patients to find clinical trials. CureMap sits on top of the ClinicalTrials.gov database and transforms the data into something a scared, overwhelmed person can actually use.

In development

What CureMap does

  • Search by condition in everyday language — AI translates to medical terminology
  • See trials on an interactive map, filterable by distance, phase, and status
  • Plain-language summaries of eligibility, participation, and what to expect
  • Track conditions you care about and get notified when new trials open
  • Compare similar trials side by side
  • Generate shareable summaries to bring to your doctor
curemap.org →

Get involved.

Hack the Cure is open to contributors, collaborators, and anyone who believes patients deserve better tools.

bill@heyman.ai