Google announced that its online filing cabinet for medical records would become open the public today, following a preview of the service in February. Called Google Health, it lets users build a personal health profile, import records from care providers and pharmacies, research diseases, and locate hospitals, doctors and online medical services.Similar existing offerings include Revolution Health, backed by AOL co-founder Steve Case and Microsoft Corp.'s HealthVault.
Marissa Mayer, Google Search Product Vice President, told the New York Times that Google Health differentiates itself from the pack through its user interface and the public availability of its application program interface, or API, allowing users to create tools such as web site widgets in order to enhance searches.
The Mountain View-based search engine views its expansion into health records management as a logical move forward due to the millions of requests it receives daily from people trying to find information about illnesses, injuries and recommended treatments.
The health venture provides fodder for privacy watchdogs who believe Google already has too much information about the habits and interests of its users in its logs of search requests and vaults of e-mail archives.
One of the most contentious aspects of Google Health is that it isn't covered by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, or HIPAA. Passed in 1996, HIPAA set strict standards for the security of medical records. Among other things, the law requires anyone seeking a patient's records by subpoena to notify the patient and give the patient an opportunity to fight the request
By transferring records to an external service, patients could unwittingly make it easier for the government, a legal adversary or a marketing concern to obtain private information.
''We are in uncharted territory here. A privacy policy, I don't think, is enough to protect what needs to be protected in a doctor-patient record,'' Pam Dixon, Executive Director of the World Privacy Forum told the New York Times.
However, in an interview with The Associated Press, Mayer assured users that Google will not aggregate their health information across services, meaning activity on the health service will not show up in search results.
In addition, Google's official blog maintains that the most important aspect of the health offering is consumer empowerment, allowing users to collect, store, and manage their own medical records online.
