Google To Push Dedicated Health Search, Making It Easier to Find Reliable Medical Information

Google’s recently established health department has done a lot of work. But it has not let the outside world know more about the actual progress of this department. However, the situation has changed now. David Feinberg, head of Google Health, revealed some of his team’s plans: ‘they did a lot of work around the search needs of patients and doctors.’ Feinberg envisions a search bar that helps doctors search for medical records like web searches. For example, a doctor can search for ‘87’ to find an 87-year-old patient instead of using the patient’s name to search.

An insider also said that Google is considering to provide a more direct search experience for people searching for medical information. So people do not have to work hard to find reliable medical information through the regular network.

It is still unclear how close these two ideas are to implementation, and sources warned that it is not certain whether the Google search team will agree to launch a dedicated health search. If a dedicated health search is launched, Google may have to give up ads on its pages. However, they do show the ideas of Google Health and Feinberg hints at their expectations for the future.

Regardless of the actual progress, Feinberg and his team may have been busy behind the scenes. Other sources said he has been ‘building bridges’ to improve health-related searches on Google and YouTube, such as diluting videos promoting anti-vaccine myths. ‘His team may be busy trying to improve your medical experience – but it’s not particularly obvious now.’