BlackBerry Invests In Health IT

SONY DSC

BlackBerry Limited is investing in NantHealth. The companies intend to collaborate on the development of HIPAA and other government privacy certified, integrated clinical systems that transform the delivery of medical care. NantHealth is a cloud-based medical IT provider. The investment is surprising given BlackBerry’s recent and significant financial concerns as the first smartphone gets taken out of the top slot by iPhone and Android.

Founded by medical entrepreneur Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, NantHealth is a platform installed at approximately 250 hospitals, and connects more than 16,000 medical devices collecting more than 3 billion vital signs annually.

The solution relies on real-time analytics to aid healthcare discovery and patient care delivery. The QNX system works as an embedded operating system for medical diagnostic and monitoring devices in hospitals and homecare environments. With BlackBerry, NantHealth will use BBM Protected an upcoming, secure communication platform to connect healthcare providers, patients and families. The move seems to suggest BlackBerry is looking to segment off some of its more popular features into other technologies.

NantHealth’s Clinical Operating System (cOS™) platform is the first operating system of its kind in healthcare. The platform integrates the knowledge base with the delivery system and the payment system to enable coordinated care plans.