The New Life of e-Patient Dave: I'm putting my data in Google and HealthVault

One patient—a former skeptic—has decided to put his health information online:

So why have I gone over?

• First, in the past year an increasingly wide range of people I trust have said "The data you're concerned about is already not as secure as you think." That doesn't leave me any more comfortable but I've come to accept that my choice of action won't make much difference.
• Second, and more importantly, I'm concluding that we can do more good by aggregating our data into large, anonymized databanks that smart software can analyze to look for patterns. Early detection means early intervention means fewer crises.
          Diabetics are already starting to do things like this. And the Cambridge MA-based PatientsLikeMe is a full-blown example of a community (ALS / Lou Gehrig's disease) where patients are tired of waiting for the medical industry to produce results. They're uploading their data (anonymized), sharing it, looking for patterns, even creating their own clinical trials.
• The third aspect, ultimately the deciding one, is something I see all the time in my day job, where we study new software tools: the power of "mash-ups." That's the ability to slap together two pieces of software (or data) that were created without knowing that the other one exists, and making something new out of them without anyone planning it in advance. Things can just grow in any direction people want.
          Mash-ups are a big part of what makes the Web what it is today: Anyone can put a Yahoo Map on their web site, I can take someone's YouTube video and put it on my blog, etc.

The power happens because this lets people create software gadgets without knowing how they'll be used, it lets people build tools that use data without knowing where the data will come from, and it lets people build big new systems just by assembling them out of "software Legos."

The New Life of e-Patient Dave: I'm putting my data in Google and HealthVault

This is completely gratifying, and exciting, to see.

I’m biased, of course, being a product manager with Microsoft’s Health Solutions Group, but I think the Dave’s third reason really should be the deciding factor. When your personal data is in the cloud and accessible through an application programming interface (API), great things can happen. People you don’t know (and who don’t know you) can help you manage your health, whether you’re just trying to stay fit and lose weight, or you’re managing a chronic condition. If your data’s locked away in an inaccessible silo, or on paper, that can’t happen.

Of course, people like Dave shouldn’t store our personal health information with a service unless we feel our wishes as to the use of that data will be strictly respected. Again, I’m biased, but I think that HealthVault does a very good job of that.