Google Health
Google Health is a branch of Google started in 2006, designed as an to attempt to create a repository of health records and data, in order to connect doctors, hospitals and pharmacies directly. The project was introduced in 2008 and discontinued in 2012. Attempts to reignite Google Health were made, and starting in November 2018, Dr. David Feinberg was appointed lead. In 2019, it was announced they want more searchable medical records and to "improve the quality of health-focused search results across Google and YouTube".
The 2008–2012 version of the service allowed Google users to volunteer their health records—either manually or by logging into their accounts at partnered health services providers—into the Google Health system, thereby merging potentially separate health records into one centralized Google Health profile. Volunteered information could include "health conditions, medications, allergies, and lab results". Once entered, Google Health used the information to provide the user with a merged health record, information on conditions, and possible interactions between drugs, conditions, and allergies. Google Health's API was based on a subset of the Continuity of Care Record.
History
Google Health was under development from mid-2006, under ex-chief health strategist Dr. Roni Zeiger. In 2008, the service underwent a two-month pilot test with 1,600 patients of The Cleveland Clinic. Starting on May 20, 2008, Google Health was released to the general public as a service in beta test stage. On September 15, 2010, Google updated Google Health with a new look and feel.On June 24, 2011 Google announced it was retiring Google Health on January 1, 2012; data was available for download through January 1, 2013. The reason Google gave for abandoning the project was the lack of widespread adoption. In 2012, Dr. Roni Zeiger left Google.
In 2018, Google reorganized their healthcare efforts, and as a result DeepMind Health became part of Google Health. They began a non disclosed project called Project Nightingale, a partnership with Ascension, a large Catholic health care system in the United States. The project was headed by head Dr. David Feinberg, hired in November 2018 and his oversight includes Google Fit, health-oriented features in Google Search, G Suite for healthcare businesses, AI-based health research offerings, and Alphabet subsidiaries DeepMind Health, Verily, and Calico. At the 2019 HLTH health care conference, Feinberg announced Google Health is working on improvements with the search functions in electronic health records and to improve health-related search results across their platforms.
Partners
Google Health, like many other Google products, was free to use for consumers. Unlike other Google services, however, Health contained no advertising. Google did not reveal how it planned to make money with the service, but a Wall Street Journal article said that Google "hasn't ruled out for the future." Google filed in 2007, U.S. Patent Application #20070282632, "Method and apparatus for serving advertisements in an electronic medical record system".Google Health imported medical and/or drug prescription information from the following partners: Allscripts, Anvita Health, The Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, The Cleveland Clinic, CVS Caremark, Drugs.com, Healthgrades, Longs Drugs, Medco Health Solutions, Quest Diagnostics, RxAmerica, and Walgreens. In January 2010, the Withings WiFi Body scale enables Google Health users to seamlessly update their weight and other data to their online profiles. Users whose health records reside with other providers had to either manually enter their data or pay to have a Google Health partner perform the service. MediConnect Global was one such partner; for a fee, they would retrieve a user's medical records from around the world and add them to his or her profile.
In 2009, in response to demand for added convenience, Google Health began establishing relationships with tele-health providers that will allow their users to sync the data shared during tele-health consultations with their online health records partnerships have been formed with the following companies: MDLiveCare and Hello Health.
In 2018, Project Nightingale started the partnership with Ascension, one of the largest United States health care systems.
Privacy concerns
Google Health was an opt-in service, meaning it could only access medical information volunteered by individuals. It did not retrieve any part of a person's medical records without his or her explicit consent and action. However, it did encourage users to set up profiles for other individuals. According to its Terms of Service, Google Health is not considered a "covered entity" under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996; thus, HIPAA privacy laws do not apply to it.In an article covering Google Health's launch, the New York Times discussed privacy issues and said that "patients apparently did not shun the Google health records because of qualms that their personal health information might not be secure if held by a large technology company." Others contend that Google Health may be more private than the current "paper" health record system because of reduced human interaction.
In November 2019, Google engineers had access to medical records held by Ascension as they were building products and as a result, the US government opened up an investigation on the partnership.
Competitors
Google's parent company Alphabet, Inc. has also been active in the healthcare industry with the companies Verily, Calico, and DeepMind. On December 7, 2011, MediConnect Global announced a similar capability that allows displaced Google Health users to transfer their personal health records to a MyMediConnect account.Google Health was a personal health record service with numerous competitors, including other proprietary PHR systems and open-source such as Microsoft's HealthVault, Dossia, and the open-source Indivo project.
In the United States hospital market for electronic health records in 2018, Epic, Cerner, MEDITECH, and CSPI had the top market share at 28%, 26%, 9%, and 6%. For large hospitals with over 500 beds, Epic and Cerner had over 85% market share in 2019.
Microsoft
On July 18, 2011, Microsoft released a tool that lets Google Health customers transfer their personal health information to a web-based Microsoft HealthVault account. HealthVault had partnered with American Heart Association, Johnson & Johnson, and Allscripts. In November 2019, Microsoft HealthVault was shut down and it was suggested users migrate their records to Get Real Health and FollowMyHealth.In 2017, Facebook had been working on a "top-secret" project headed by Dr. Freddy Abnousi to take anonymous medical data and using a common computer science cryptographic technique called “hashing” in order to match individuals. Alleged this information would only be used for the medical research community. Additionally there had been the idea of building virtual profiles of patients that included their medical conditions, as well as their social and economic factors.