Monitoring health of users has been a growing trend among tech companies, especially when it comes to mobile devices. But Microsoft seems to backtracking a bit, as it will be pulling its HealthVault Insights app from iOS, Android, and Windows stores later this month.
The move comes less than a year after the app was first introduced as part of a way to help "transform healthcare." But in a short post today on the official HealthVault site, Microsoft revealedthe app was being dropped:
We launched HealthVault Insights as a research project last year, with the goal of helping patients generate new insights about their health. Since then, we've learned a lot about how machine learning can be used to increase patient engagement and are now applying that knowledge to other projects. As part of this progression, we've made the decision to remove HealthVault Insights from the iOS, Android and Windows stores effective later this month. This change will have no impact on the data users generated in HealthVault Insights, which will continue be accessible via the HealthVault website.
Unfortunately, "later this month" is a bit nebulous, so if you do want to grab it and try it and keep track of your data, do it now.
Microsoft has made it sound like the app was never really supposed to be a long-term item, so it will be interesting to see if it is planning an evolution of the app or offer what the "other projects" are that might integrate what it learned through the app and its usage.
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