Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Digital Health Is Expanding At Rapid Speeds — But Is It Improving Patients' Outcomes?
As new digital tools from wearables to electronic health records to boxes that can track patients’ movements in their homes promise to reshape health care, it is crucial to scrutinize the massive amount of data being generated to ensure that interventions are actually improving health outcomes. That was a takeaway message from a group of regulatory and drug development experts at a conference held at MIT on Friday focused on how digital health and artificial intelligence are affecting translational medicine. (Joseph, 4/3)
In other health and technology news, health care companies eye the potential of blockchain —
Five healthcare giants are diving into blockchain, looking into how to use the technology to improve data quality and lower administrative costs. Humana, Multiplan, UnitedHealth Group's Optum, UnitedHealthcare and Quest Diagnostics are embarking on a pilot program to apply blockchain to healthcare provider demographic data. By using the encrypted system of data exchange that relies on a distributed ledger, they aim to make this data both more accurate and administratively friendly. (Arndt, 4/2)
UnitedHealth Group is joining forces with a rival health insurer and one of the nation’s largest lab testing companies to see if blockchain technology can improve health care data. On Monday, UnitedHealth is announcing the pilot project in conjunction with Kentucky-based Humana, New Jersey-based Quest Diagnostics and a New York firm called MultiPlan. Financial terms were not disclosed. (Snowbeck, 4/2)
