HIMSS: Google announces integrations, new PHR technologies
Google announced a couple of integration agreements and technology additions for its Google Health product at this year’s HIMSS in Atlanta, including an integration with e-prescribing provider Surescripts and a future collaboration with the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.
“Google Health’s message is that consumer empowerment is now agreed upon as a valuable step in improving healthcare outcomes and decreasing costs--and it’s a step the country has decided to make,” said Alfred Z. Spector, vice president of research and special initiatives, at the conference last week. “Google Health can help hospital CMOs by making it easy to get EMR information available to patients.”
At Google’s booth, new customization, personalization and tracking tool demos were showcased in the company's patient health record (PHR) where a user could track wellness goals overtime through a retrospective health analysis. To make the PHR user-friendly, data presentation can also be customized and manipulated to accent the health information that’s important to the user to tell their complete story, stated Julie Wilner, RN, program manager for Google Health.
Google Health also aggregates search results data so users can find more information that’s relevant to them. For example, according to Wilner, if a patient is searching their blood pressure information, the PHR could pull in content in a sidebar to highlight what’s in the news on blood pressure.
The integration with Surescripts is to help accelerate the availability of prescription drug history to its users, according to Google, of Mountain View, Calif.
“The Surescripts network connects doctors who prescribe medication to U.S. pharmacy chains, health insurance plans and pharmacy benefits managers, as well as more than 10,000 U.S. independent pharmacies,” the company stated.
The future integration with UPMC, according to the company, will give patients the ability to add health information to an EHR maintained by doctors using their own Google Health PHR. In addition to Google Health, UPMC is also working on this integration with the Pittsburgh-based Carnegie Mellon University and technology company dbMotion, the company stated.
Finally, the company also announced at HIMSS10 its partnerships with Citizen Memorial Healthcare, a rural healthcare network providing care to residents in southwest Missouri, Iatric Systems, an integration consultant, which can facilitate Google Health integrations for hospitals and healthcare systems and the Withings WiFi Body Scale, which allows Google Health users to update their weight and other data to their online profiles.
“Google Health’s message is that consumer empowerment is now agreed upon as a valuable step in improving healthcare outcomes and decreasing costs--and it’s a step the country has decided to make,” said Alfred Z. Spector, vice president of research and special initiatives, at the conference last week. “Google Health can help hospital CMOs by making it easy to get EMR information available to patients.”
At Google’s booth, new customization, personalization and tracking tool demos were showcased in the company's patient health record (PHR) where a user could track wellness goals overtime through a retrospective health analysis. To make the PHR user-friendly, data presentation can also be customized and manipulated to accent the health information that’s important to the user to tell their complete story, stated Julie Wilner, RN, program manager for Google Health.
Google Health also aggregates search results data so users can find more information that’s relevant to them. For example, according to Wilner, if a patient is searching their blood pressure information, the PHR could pull in content in a sidebar to highlight what’s in the news on blood pressure.
The integration with Surescripts is to help accelerate the availability of prescription drug history to its users, according to Google, of Mountain View, Calif.
“The Surescripts network connects doctors who prescribe medication to U.S. pharmacy chains, health insurance plans and pharmacy benefits managers, as well as more than 10,000 U.S. independent pharmacies,” the company stated.
The future integration with UPMC, according to the company, will give patients the ability to add health information to an EHR maintained by doctors using their own Google Health PHR. In addition to Google Health, UPMC is also working on this integration with the Pittsburgh-based Carnegie Mellon University and technology company dbMotion, the company stated.
Finally, the company also announced at HIMSS10 its partnerships with Citizen Memorial Healthcare, a rural healthcare network providing care to residents in southwest Missouri, Iatric Systems, an integration consultant, which can facilitate Google Health integrations for hospitals and healthcare systems and the Withings WiFi Body Scale, which allows Google Health users to update their weight and other data to their online profiles.