Amazon Alexa celebrates HIPAA-compliant data transfer with six new healthcare skills | MobiHealthNe…

Earlier this morning, Amazon announced in a blog post that its voice-based Alexa platform now supports the development of software that communicates HIPAA-protected health information through an invite-only Alexa Skills Kit program.

To kick off the new capability, the company also highlighted the launch of six new Alexa skills built by healthcare providers and other stakeholders. Each is designed to help members, patients and caretakers manage care at home with easy-to-use voice commands.

“From our view, [Alexa’s data protection] makes for great opportunity in healthcare, because what we’re trying to do is make it easier for patients to access information, easier for patients to track their health and easier for patients to interact with their healthcare system,” Dr. John Brownstein, chief innovation officer at Boston Children’s Hospital, which released one of the six new skills, told MobiHealthNews. “Voice represents a great leap forward — as much as it is challenging for someone to log into their patient portal, download and train them in a mobile app, out of the box Alexa works. … It just makes sense to use these tools that are hands free and utilize the main modality that we use to communicate, voice, to improve care.”