Written by David Cerino, General Manager, Health Solutions Group

Over the last several months, Microsoft has made a number of investments in Microsoft HealthVault, an online service that helps consumers manage, store and share their health information.  Since last fall, we’ve announced several initiatives designed to help put the patient at the center of health and healthcare. We’re working with the US Federal Government to help veterans and Medicare beneficiaries download their medical records and  to enable patients to receive encrypted emails from their physicians. We’ve developed new functionality for HealthVault that lets consumers upload medical images and burn them to a CD/DVD, and we’ve made HealthVault available in new countries and languages.   

Recently, HSG’s Distinguished Engineer Sean Nolan shared details on the latest update to HealthVault on his Family Health Guy blog. This release includes some great enhancements – for users and developers.  The things I’m most excited about:

•  We’ve gone mobile!
  • There’s a new mobile experience, formatted for the smartphone and specifically designed for quick access to what’s most important during a health encounter. Need to remember when you had your last tetanus shot for a form? You can now easily pull up that information in HealthVault on your phone.
  • We’ve added some new libraries to the HealthVault Software Developers Kit (SDK) and are officially inviting one and all to build HealthVault apps for Windows Phone 7, with libraries soon to be added for Android and iOS. 
• Updating HealthVault is easier. We’re working to put the USEFUL in Meaningful Use! As more and more clinicians share information with their patients in the Continuity of Care Record (CCR) and Continuity of Care Document (CCD) formats, we wanted to make it easier for patients to update their HealthVault records with the details that are in the documents, enabling folks to easily use the information with other applications.  To date, this has been a manual process, but with this update, we’ve enabled auto-reconcile by default. 
• We have more options for login. We know that the way people live online is changing.  For many people, much of their time online is spent on Facebook so, with this release, we’re allowing users to sign into HealthVault using their Facebook credentials. PLEASE NOTE: this is for authentication only and does NOT mean that HealthVault information shows up on someone’s Facebook page!

As a refresher, here’s some of our other HealthVault news from the last few months:

• It’s all about the pictures: medical imaging arrives at HealthVault! April 13, 2011 An update to HealthVault Connection Center which allows you to upload your medical images, and then burn to CD/DVD to share with your providers.
• Just in time for HIMSS: new HealthVault features! Feb. 11, 2011 Easier sign-up, better Blue Button integration, new security features, and new languages were the features of our last HealthVault update.
• Microsoft Delivers Online Encrypted E-mail Using Direct Project Security Protocols Feb. 2, 2011 HealthVault signs on as one of the first examples of how providers will be able to use the ONC’s security protocols to send encrypted e-mail patients.  
• Agreement to Develop Citizen Health Solutions in China Using HealthVault Oct. 29, 2010 A joint announcement with partner iSoftStone to build a digital health innovation center and HealthVault for China as the first step of a joint healthcare effort in Wuxi, China.
• Press the button! Oct. 7, 2010 Microsoft creates an app for HealthVault to import and parse data from VA or Medicare via their “Blue Button” initiative.