Google is shutting down Streams, a mobile app developed to help clinicians track patients' conditions, just two years after finalizing its acquisition, according to an Aug. 27 Insider report.
Four things to know:
- Streams has been in use in a number of the U.K.'s best-known National Health Service hospitals for the past five years, Insider reported.
- Google Health first set out to acquire U.K. startup DeepMind for more than $500 million in 2014. The acquisition wouldn't be finalized until 2019. In this acquisition, Google Health gained control of Streams from DeepMind.
- Three years before Google acquired the app, Streams faced criticism for having unlawful access to 1.6 million patients' data as part of an arrangement with a London hospital, Insider reported. The U.K. data regulator ruled the deal was unlawful.
- Decommissioning the app comes a week after Google confirmed it was dissolving its Google Health division and splitting health projects among its other departments. David Feinberg, MD, the chief of Google Health, is set to depart the tech giant for a CEO role at Cerner Sept. 1.