More than 30,000 people have so far integrated their health data with third-party apps, enabling them to receive highly personalized health information, the National Health Insurance Administration (NHIA) said on Tuesday.
Since its creation on Sept. 25, 2014, the agency’s “My Health Bank” service has served 10.82 million people, NHIA Department of Planning Director Chuang Hsin-yi (莊欣怡) told a news conference in Taipei.
The digital service enables people to view their medical history online, including inpatient, outpatient and dental records from the past three years, as well as vaccinations, allergic reactions, drug prescriptions, examination reports, and organ donation and hospice care preferences. The service can also send them reminders to see a doctor for a checkup.
To provide people a more seamless experience, the agency in March 2019 created a software development kit (SDK) for developers to incorporate NHI data into their apps with user permission.
Users who want to integrate their data with third-party apps can do so by logging in with their “My Health Bank” login through the app they wish to use, Chuang said.
A prompt with privacy information is displayed, including the option to individually select what data the app is allowed to access, she said.
Doing so would enable the app to integrate data from selected healthcare institutions and departments, eliminating the need to personally request and pay for health records at each healthcare provider, Chuang said.
For people with chronic diseases such as diabetes, renal disease or hypertension, granting access to health data could enable apps to analyze long-term trends and changes to provide a personalized healthcare regime, she said.
Health management apps can also integrate data from personal devices to provide online health consultations and dietary recommendations, she added.
At present, 148 institutions have applied to use the SDK for 349 apps, Chuang said.
Of them, 64 apps by 31 institutions are available to download, including those from National Taiwan University Hospital, Tri-Service General Hospital, Cathay Healthcare Management, Great Tree Pharmacy and Chunghwa Telecom, she said.
All those institutions have been vetted to ensure they offer sufficient information security and file encryption, Chuang said, adding that users have the right to request apps to delete data, and to stop collecting and using their information.
NHIA Director-General Lee Po-chang (李伯璋) said the “My Health Bank” SDK is different from access to NHI data.
When a user wants an app to access their data, they must grant permission and can choose what information can be accessed, he said, adding that permissions can be changed at any time.
At the news conference, Jubo Health demonstrated its app, Digital Care Note (數位照護Note), which analyzes “My Health Bank” data to calculate the user’s cardiovascular health index and automatically assess symptoms of “long COVID-19.”
Syspower demonstrated its Qi Xiaowei (奇小葳) app, which integrates data from wearable devices with NHI data, and provides charts of health trends and personalized health information.
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