The researchers couldn’t determine what the patients did after getting an analysis of their symptoms. “That would be something for a follow-up study,” Winn said.
Dr. Gabe Kelen was both “excited” and “concerned,” about the new tool.
“I wonder, what is the business model for the company,” said Dr. Kelen, a professor and chair of the department of emergency medicine at Johns Hopkins Medicine in Baltimore, Maryland. “Are they selling this data to somebody? I wonder if patients are unwittingly putting their health status out there on the internet.”
On the other hand, “the exciting part is this technology probably not only can’t be stopped but also if properly developed and used could be a disrupter in healthcare delivery,” said Dr. Kelen, who wasn’t involved in the study. “I really like that and think it is the future. In our department we have developed an electronic triage tool. We looked at hundreds of thousands of cases and tested it in a number of settings.”
The idea behind the Hopkins tool is to ferret out the patients with the most urgent needs for care, Dr. Kelen said.
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