Feb 29 2008
Google Health - I Don’t Know - But Neither do They
Google Health is going to fail, it’s that simple. Actually since it will be in perpetual beta no one will notice.
It’s going to fail for the same reason that all PHRs are going to fail. You can’t design a system when you don’t have process and policy in place. In the US health market you have neither.
Right now we have the classic general system design philosophy being practiced. “If you don’t like the facts, get rid of them” Whether its Google Health, AllScripts, or Revolution Health its all a bunch of arrogant tech money trying to make more tech money, won’t work.
Neither the doctor nor the patient are truly at the center of any of these efforts.
Neither are most of the real stakeholders, a very long list.
Do I have a better idea, sure, who doesn’t. The question is how long will it take before the right people come to the table, some time. So in the meantime thanks for the betas, we’re all watching and learning.
I just viewed the Google Health site and am very disturbed. I was able to login [very first time] with my gmail id/password. This is the same id/password for any of Google’s sites. This is terrible personal security for the individual as they could be exposing all their information without knowing it. Until online sites develop a better login system that ids/passwords, I will not use an online site for medical records.