IBM, Google Health Aim to Blow Medical Records Wide Open
IBM, Google Health and a consortium of medical device makers and other companies announced today that they have created a software platform that will allow medical data from at-home devices like glucose meters and blood pressure monitors to be sent automatically to Google Health or other Personal Health Records systems online. It's a broad reaching software platform that will bring data portability and medical records interoperability in direct conflict with a huge industry entrenched in siloed data.
If you think that "data portability" and standards for an open web hold a lot of promise to fuel innovation in social networking, just imagine what a secure, standards-based, data landscape could enable in health care.
While the Obama administration is looking to pump billions of dollars into modernizing health care, and health care records in particular, industry thought leaders are urging the US government to advance that funding with requirements concerning open data standards and interoperability. The consortium's software platform being announced today could be an example of the kind of technology we'll be seeing a lot more of, soon.
The Continua Alliance, made up of companies like Nokia, Intel and Panasonic, along with IBM and Google, highlighted a handful of factors in the announcement. The technology will be useful in a wide variety of case types ("including chronic disease management, health and wellness, and elderly care"), in the US and around the world. By leveraging online services, the platform will enable healthcare providers to leverage scale in ways that otherwise isolated medical monitoring can not. And by putting the software into widespread use, the group hopes to make significant headway in supporting open standards and "interoperable healthcare products and solutions." That's on top of all the standard consumer benefits of online health records. (See coverage at Medgadget for more details and a link to the press release.) The companies don't yet have any name for the platform but say it's tested and ready to deploy.
The group also said that supporting the development of Google Health was one of its goals, but we hope that the technology will support the development of an entire ecosystem of complimentary, competing and interoperable health data services.
That kind of language is both similar to what advocates of social networking "data portability" use and represents the kind of steps we'd love to see more of from big vendors in all kinds of technology sectors.
Open, standardized data, backed up by certified security measures and serving as the foundation of a new era of innovation is a fantastic vision. If you think that big players in social networking have a financial interest in data lock-in, though, just imagine the resistance that "data portability" could face in the multi-trillion dollar medical industry.
The companies collaborating on this platform believe that consumer demand for informed care, combined with the vendor participation already gathered, will force the rest of the industry to open, down to every medical practitioner challenged by patients to use portable data in treatment. That seems like a sound strategy to us.
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this could be one of the most important technology in health care advances ever.
Neat. Glad to see a competitor for the personal health records platform that Microsoft has built (http://healthcentral.com).
I just hope the big guys have an easier time convincing doctors to do lots and lots of IT work to make it easier for their patients to defect to another doctor than it sounds like they ought to.
How will this data be backed up and preserved? Who will actually test the back ups for billions of records to make sure they are actually backed up? Who will migrate these files, pay for their long-term maintenance and preservation? How does the cost of this over the lifetime of a file compare to that of a paper record? The indications are that migrating and storing actually does cost more than on paper, when all costs like electricity, personnel, etc., etc. are added in. Who will pay these costs? I can access my paper medical records from 1-30 years ago. What about 20 years from now, will I be able to access the records? What happens if they are lost? Who pays to retake any needed tests?
My dental records were lost in 2006; the organization that supposedly had them backed up, didn't. I no longer lived in that area, and the org would not send me a reimbursement to have the x-rays retaken. In order to have them redone for free, I had to go back to that actual dentist. What if the lost tests aren't dental x-rays, but something that cannot be "re-done"? Who pays for that? How do you handle the health issues that may come out of that? For 320 million people.
And that doesn't even address the security issues associated with this.
Personally, I'm happy for my records to stay private; I don't want anyone to have access to them other than someone who actually works in a particular building.
Insurance companies, Uncle Sam, and you pay for it. Why do u think heatlhcare is so expensive in the U.S.?
thanks.
Very interesting - it had to happen - with more to follow no doubt...
I blogged on this theme last week:
http://hodges-model.blogspot.com/2009/02/confidential-letter-to-self-and-you-and.html
http://snipurl.com/beqf7 [hodges-model_blogspot_com]
"(Confidential) Letter to self - and you, and you, and you... ?"
Best,
Peter Jones
Hodges' model
http://www.p-jones.demon.co.uk/
Joe: that's my point. This is great for companies, who will make a lot of money off of the data. Our data. But is this "better" for the patient? What are the pros and cons of this for consumers vs. the paper system? For doctors, nurses, and hospitals? Isn't this just more IT worry? For whose gain? I love IT, but I've worked in it far too long to be anything but cynical about what will happen to my records.
Whoa. You're joking, right?
For a techno-geek who loves the IT aspects of life, yes, it's a great business model.
But can you imagine what google will do with all this information? They will sell it to the highest bidder, of course.
You think Joe Patient has trouble getting health insurance now? Just wait until XYZ Insurance buys his blood pressure readings from google... which means Joe Patient will end up on the taxpayer's dollar for his care.
You might want to rethink the value of this kind of collaboration with a company known to be doing nothing but making megabucks off personal information.
Trisha Torrey
Every Patient's Advocate
http://patients.about.com
You have a broken link to the Medgadget story about IBM and Google. It should point here: http://www.medgadget.com/archives/2009/02/ibm_links_at_home_medical_devices_with_google_health.html
cheers
for real - ibm and google are in the business of virtualizing you... as in, charting out exactly what makes you tick and why, then running scenarios on that data to figure out whether your worth doing x to or y to. that's understandable, sort of, but who's in charge here? you or them?
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Why oh why is this story getting so much airplay. Did IBM and Google plead with everyone in the press to make a big deal out of this?
The only reason I ask is for the simple fact that Microsoft's HealthVault has been providing this type of functionality from Day 1, which was nearly a year and a half ago!
Is the real story simply the partnership btwn IBM & Google? Beyond that really can't figure out why the press is so ga-ga.
Please, someone, anyone clue me in on the feeding frenzy
A patient's information can best be thought of as currency.
Transferring of this currency may be useful to a patient at times, but it will be controlled by the patient.
It seems likely that the vast majority of patients will prefer to store their data in trusted "banks" releasing their currency in carefully measured increments.
As we have witnessed, banks, capital or informational are not to be trusted.
Patients are advised to be careful as to where and with whom they entrust their records.
This is a very interesting post onIT and health care joining together for maximum efficiency t. I still believe that our private info should not be transferred digitally, only stored digitally and not connected to the web in anyway.
Check this out , pretty disturbing already
http://www.nextgov.com/nextgov/ng_20090227_9147.php
It is important to make sure that all of your medical records are safe and secure which is why I am thrilled that they are going to be turning all medical records into electronic medical records. I feel allot safer knowing that not just anyone who stumbles into the office can look through my medical records and steal all of my personal information.
What about all the millions upon millions of pages of medical records that are already on paper? Are we going to have two systems -- one on paper and one electronic? Electronic medical records are a great idea and just a matter of time. Having all the records electronic will be much easier to find information and make sure patient histories are complete.
thanks...
this could be one of the most important technology in health care advances ever.
Insurance companies, Uncle Sam, and you pay for it. Why do u think heatlhcare is so expensive in the U.S.?
I do this already with my HealthVault account, and it's great. But healthy competition is alway good.
Thanks good article