Microsoft today unveiled their new consumer health and search site Health Vault. Built around their fairly impressive health search engine, Microsoft hopes that the site will become a central repository for people to store and selectively share their health information and records, including patient records, test results, and prescription info.
I have no doubt that eventually health records will be stored online. Easier access and sharing of health information between doctors and hospitals is something that can lead to better and quicker diagnoses, less headaches when changing doctors or moving to a new town, and less chance of a serious condition being missed by a doctor. Many large companies are betting on the future of online health information portals, Google, Intel, and Cisco all have initiatives underway in this area. But there are major hurdles toward gaining public trust and acceptance, not least of which is security concerns.
Personal health records are something most people guard very closely -- as closely as financial account information. I agree with Search Engine Land's Greg Sterling, who points out that the success of HealthVault or any similar endeavor is tied very closely to the outcome of universal health care proposals in the United States. People will be far more likely to feel comfortable putting their health records online knowing that their insurance coverage won't be in jeopardy should that information leak out.
Microsoft says that they have taken pains in creating a secure environment to ensure user privacy and control over who has access to health records. The company says they worked "in cooperation with leading privacy advocates, respected security experts and dozens of the world’s leading healthcare organizations" to create a platform that users can feel comfortable storing their sensitive health data on.
HealthVault stores data on its own infrastructure, separate from other Microsoft properties, and users have control over who gets access to their personal information. Health searches done on the site are conducted anonymously and not linked to users' personal data. Microsoft acknowledges that users are unlikely to add much personal information to the site regardless of privacy protections promised by the company, but they hope that users will give permission for their doctors to utilize the site as a central storage repository for health information.
In that vein, Microsoft announced a number of partners for the site including NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, Johnson & Johnson, the Mayo Clinic, Diet.com, and Texas Instruments. The partners fall into three main categories: hospitals and doctors, web sites, and device manufacturers who will allow users to automatically upload readings from medical devices such as blood glucose monitors or heart monitors to their personal HealthVault accounts.
On the search side, the new HealthVault health search vertical is rather impressive. Searches on the site combine relational refinements (i.e., search for "wheat" and the site will recommend that you search for "celiac disease" as well), article content from sources like Wikipedia and the Mayo Clinic, and web results in an attractively laid out search results page. The site also serves up sponsored results and book recommendations from Amazon.
Tying into HealthVault, members of the site can save search results to a personal "health scrapbook." Article and web site results are added to the scrapbook individually, allowing users to pick and choose their favorite information and create a private, personal resource for whatever it is they're searching.
I personally would be very hesitant to store medical records online. Having once been almost burned by my health insurance company because they had access to health records, I am very protective of my medical records. I generally think that a lot of people feel that way about their personal medical information.
Would you trust Microsoft, or Google, or Intel, or any other company with your personal health information? If health care was guaranteed to you regardless of your medical history would you be more apt to store health records online? What do you think of HealthVault's search? Better or worse than competing search engines in the health vertical? Leave your thoughts in the comments below.
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J&J and Diet.com are partners? What business do they have being associated with a site that stores my very private health records? Datamining for marketing purposes is the only reason I can think of. That's supposed to make me feel safe!? No way in hell. I want to pay. a service because I want the. provider to have a direct profit incentiveto protect my data.
Posted by: kevindwhite | October 4, 2007 4:38 PM
Like I'm going to trust Microsoft to do anything?
M$ can't even produce a decent operating system any more.
Why would anyone expect them to do store health records competently?
Posted by: rtyhurst | October 4, 2007 8:57 PM
This is another application for the Private Identity Network (read more at replacegoogle.com). In the Private Identity Network, users may choose to store their health records with their chosen Private Identity Provider. The Provider in turn shares the records if/as specified by the user's parameters.
Users choose their Private Identity Provider from among entities that are Network accredited and are all competing to be the most trusted and therefore successful Provider. Health records are just one of many solutions that are part of the prospective Private Identity Network. To get more info please visit replacegoogle.com.
Posted by: Trey Tomeny | October 4, 2007 8:59 PM
Fresh breath of innovation from microsoft house after a so long time.
one thing microsoft cant left behind is Copy Cat.
if you look at the features very closely i can point out that microsoft trying to replicate googlistyle.
1. Scrapbook.. [ah.]
2. see the overall layout. blue hyperlinks with clean boxes.
[ seems more alike googled ]
3. light colors [ where are all the gradients from redmond ]
M$ really trying to steal google's UI perspective.
Posted by: Hardik | October 4, 2007 9:40 PM
Group Health Cooperative - an insurance/medical system based in Seattle - started their own version of a web-based personal health profile for their members earlier this year when I was working there as a temp. The initial response wasn't so great, and they had to keep adding more and more incentives to get people to sign up. People will be wary of putting such personal information out there for a while, probably until the next "big thing" in web security comes out. And I bet Google's version is going be more popular just because, as stated earlier, we've already come to learn not to trust Microsoft.
Posted by: JM | October 5, 2007 6:46 AM
Have been watching this closely. Why store it online, why not have an application that provides a standard structure for input and simply store it on my home PC where I can make it available to whomever I want? This is just too scary given the history with all these companies.
Posted by: Liz Coker | October 5, 2007 7:00 AM
I first wrote about the Electronic Medical Chart (it has many names) 20 years ago. You still have to pick up your records and take them from one doc to another. I have a doc who won't even fax them. When you are in the hosp (say over a weekend), no one tells your doctor anything. Who is going to read these records--I only have one doc who uses a computer to tap in info. Another tries to make the computer spell things he is saying aloud. Very tedious. A study showed recently that 2/3 of doctors go online daily for information to help their patients. To me this is totally not credible! OK, a lie! Only an eighth of docs will return an email, this study said--I say far lower. It is not the security that bothers me as much as the total useless of this effort. The venues--hosps, docs, pharms--are only halfway linked and that currently does little for the good of the patients. And so I mock!
Posted by: Star | October 5, 2007 11:01 AM
There are so many typos on doctors' reports that are electronically sent all over the country that I would advise patients to get a hard copy. Check your x-ray report against the written report. I have found cms which should have been mms, wrong times on Holter monitor tests, a blood thinner instead of Fosamex listed as being discussed for osteoporsis, dates on heart test reports that did not correspond with date test given, more tests listed than given, etc. etc.--(about 90% have some kind of typo or goof) and these reports with errors are from several parts of the country. The reports are only as good as the staff that writes them and are seldem proof read by the doctor...SO--get your medical records and check them-- and doctors should not depend on info. on electronic records.
Posted by: mickey zee | October 7, 2007 11:13 AM