Stanford launches its HealthKit- and Epic-connected MyHealth app

Many large hospitals in the U.S. are evaluating or developing pilot projects around Apple’s HealthKit platform. Stanford Health Care is among the first to actually offer a working app that exchanges data between the Epic patient record system and Apple’s platform.

SHC quietly announced Tuesday the release of its new iOS 8 MyHealth mobile app for patients (no Android app yet).

The app was developed in-house by Stanford Health Care (SHC) engineers, and connects directly with Epic’s electronic health records system, and with Apple’s HealthKit to collect data from consumer health data monitoring devices like Fitbit wearables, for example.

SHC says patients can use the app to view test results and medical bills, manage prescriptions, schedule appointments, and conducti video visits with Stanford physicians.

The app supports Stanford Health Care’s new ClickWell Care, a telemedicine service that connects patients with Stanford doctors online. ClickWell also provides patients with a customized wellness coaching program from a certified personal trainer, who monitors data from the patient’s home health devices.

“We provide care for some of the most technologically sophisticated patients in the country, whose lives revolve around innovation,” said Stanford Health Care CEO Amir Dan Rubin in a statement. “After carefully evaluating all of the available mobile technologies, we recognized that to meet the needs and expectations of our patients we had to develop our own solution that worked seamlessly with our existing electronic health record system,” Rubin added.

The MyHealth app also creates offers a secure messaging platform where patients can communicate directly with caregivers. Using HealthKit, the MyHealth app syncs automatically with whatever consumer wellness devices or clinical home care devices the patient might use. The data received from the devices is automatically added to the patient’s chart in Epic for their physician to review remotely.

“By integrating with companies like Withings, our physicians have access to meaningful patient data right in Epic, without having to ask the patient to come in for an appointment,” said SHC CIO Pravene Nath, MD, in a statement. “We believe this is the future of how care will be delivered for many types of chronic conditions.”

Stanford Health Care consists of a large university hospital, primary care offices throughout the Bay Area, and outpatient clinics in Redwood City and Palo Alto, California.