Wearable Health-Monitoring Devices Could Alter Traditional Role of Pathologists as Gatekeepers of Medical Laboratory Test Data
Consumers embrace wearable health-monitoring technology as developers find new ways to transfer collected health data directly into patient records
Traditionally, medical laboratories have been the gatekeepers for the lab test data of most patients. After all, it is regularly said that 70% or more of a patient’s permanent health record is made up of clinical laboratory test data. However, several market forces are at play that could eat away at the long-standing role of medical laboratories as the primary gatekeepers of patient test data.
Today, consumers increasingly want to use wearable devices that not only track their health and fitness, but are designed to also eventually stream self-monitored health data directly into clinical data repositories. As these wearable devices are cleared to use the same biomarkers involved in clinical laboratory tests to monitor the wearer’s health condition, then these devices will stream that data into the electronic health records (EHR) of patients with chronic diseases. (more…)
