Medical Billing Companies Key to Microsoft Health Vault's Success

Los Angeles, CA (PRWEB) October 30, 2007 -- Among the Internet's many promises of a brave new world, a centralized database full of every American's private medical data is the latest innovation to be pursued by Microsoft's ambitious team of programmers and dreamers. The health database known as Health Vault launched at www.healthvault.com will store all of a customer's health related information including, but not limited to, blood sugar, weight, blood pressure, lab results and x-rays.

If the use of this new digital technology within the American health care industry is actually going to take place, medical billing companies will most likely be the ones spearheading the transition. Medical billing is the fastest growing sector in the American Health care industry, increasingly saving doctors and nurses from being buried in overwhelming paper work and tedious record keeping tasks. Most of the EMR (Electronic Medical Records) transition that now is considered standard practice by doctors and insurance companies alike in today's health care industry was originally aided by the medical billing companies whose task it is to tend to each and every detail of a patients medical costs and insurance company charges.

With over 35 million hospital stays every year, the United States spends a larger share of its Gross Domestic Product on health care related costs than any other industrialized country in the world. Health care spending represents one-seventh of the nation's GDP, making it the largest U.S. industry according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Due to the enormous opportunity for the right company to profit from a universal health care data base, many companies have already attempted to create such a database in the past with little success. Intel, Revolution and Google are all companies that have tried to make the universally accessible health database a reality, but failed in the process. Part of the reason has to do with doctors.

"Doctors are, for the most part, very conservative and resistant to change" said Marc Haberman of www.medical-billing.com. "The American health industry is behind the times by about 30 years as far as technology deployment and digital records keeping are concerned because most doctors are focused on patient care and don't have time to upset the apple cart of their back offices. The medical billing companies are usually at the forefront of pushing new technologies into standard practice in medical record keeping."

Steve Ballmer, Microsoft's chief executive who spearheaded the health Vault project, believes that in our day and age everyone's medical records and data should be centrally stored, accessible only by the patient and certain medical personnel given temporary permission to upload or download specific records. Despite the many issues regarding the invasion of consumer privacy and private information being lost, stolen or sold to the highest bidder the new centralized internet based system offers many benefits. Regardless of where they travel in the world participating patients and their doctors would be able to access their medical records.

For more information about the topic which is the subject of this article please contact:

Marc Haberman

http://medical-billing.com

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