On Wednesday, Apple said its latest iOS update would enable consumers to input their health records on the Health app to increase EHR portability. Now, the healthcare community is at odds over whether the tech company's latest move will be successful.
Here are six reasons why Apple will succeed, according to ZDNet Editor-in-Chief Larry Dignan.
1. Apple's HealthKit gave the company a leg up in the health data business. Its Apple Watch and iPhone already collect "micro-level" data like heart rate, activity and more recently, certain medical conditions, he writes.
2. It selected the right partners — leading EHR giants like Epic, Cerner and athenahealth — who understand the health data guidelines for transferring information, called Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources. Those companies can feed Apple the patient data from participating medical institutions while Apple acts as the aggregator.
3. The medical institutions rolling out Apple's health records feature are among the top hospitals in the nation and are key medical data players. Some of these include Baltimore-based Johns Hopkins Medicine and Philadelphia-based Penn Medicine. What's more, those facilities have connections to Apple's EHR partners, Mr. Dignan writes.
4. The healthcare industry already primed Apple an entrance, Mr. Dignan argues. Government regulations over the last decade have encouraged integration so now all Apple needs to do is incorporate the data into consumer devices.
5. Apple can leverage its enterprise footprint since IT executives are the direct target of Apple's health records pitch, according to Mr. Dignan.
6. Apple has some of the strongest approaches to privacy, which is a necessity to health records management. Apple said health records will be encrypted and protected with a user's iPhone password.
Click here to read Mr. Dignan's article.
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