A group of healthcare and technology companies have formed the Continua Health Alliance in an effort to improve the quality of healthcare by promoting technology standards that make it easier to connect health and personal fitness products.
Computer chip giant Intel is spearheading the alliance, which also includes such firms as GE Healthcare, Royal Philips Electronics, Cisco Systems, IBM, Medtronic, Motorola, Kaiser Permanente, and Welch Allyn, as well as others. The deal was announced at a news conference in San Francisco on June 6.
The group said it hopes to make it easier for consumers to monitor their health by exchanging data between devices, such as from a blood pressure or glucose monitor to their computer at home. Home PCs could maintain databases of health information that could then transfer information to physicians. The group plans to focus on three main areas: chronic disease management, monitoring the health and healthcare needs of aging people, and proactive health and fitness.
The group said it would not create new networking standards in developing interoperability guidelines for its members, but rather would leverage standards already in existence, such as Bluetooth, USB, Wi-Fi, and others. The group plans to deliver its guidelines in the next 18 months.
Continua members see a future in which a product certification program would brand devices with a recognizable logo that signifies their interoperability with other products from members of the alliance.
By AuntMinnie.com staff writers
June 8, 2006
Copyright © 2006 AuntMinnie.com
