According to reports, a group of traditional tech giants, including Alphabet, Amazon, IBM, Microsoft, and Salesforce, proposed a similar set of standards and pledged to make products (including selling medical supplies directly to hospitals and clinics) that support them to help the healthcare industry.
The group wants to build tools for the health community around a set of common standards for exchanging health information electronically, called “FHIR.” FHIR offers healthcare providers and patients the opportunity to revolutionize how they interact with their data.
In a joint statement the group stated:
We are jointly committed to removing barriers for the ad option of technologies for healthcare interoperability, particularly those that are enabled through the cloud and AI. We share the common quest to unlock the potential in healthcare data, to deliver better outcomes at lower costs.
In another news report, Amazon has brought on a few medical experts since the start of 2018, including a world-famous cardiologist, the newest in a line of hires designed to strengthen the online retailer’s movement into $3 trillion health care sector. In January, Amazon through a partnership with JPMorgan Chase and Berkshire Health created an independent company which provides reduced- cost high quality healthcare to their employees.
From the press release: “The healthcare system is complex, and we enter into this challenge open-eyed about the degree of difficulty,” said Jeff Bezos, Amazon founder and CEO. “Hard as it might be, reducing healthcare’s burden on the economy while improving outcomes for employees and their families would be worth the effort. Success is going to require talented experts, a beginner’s mind, and a long-term orientation.”
