Google plans to shut down its controversial Streams app, which analysed medical record information and aimed to improve monitoring of vital signs and other tests to improve care.
The tech company鈥檚 AI subsidiary, DeepMind, first announced in February 2016 that it was working with the National Health Service (NHS) trusts to analyse patient data. The company intended to combine machine learning with bulk medical data to develop models that could predict or diagnose acute kidney injury.
But a New 杏吧原创 investigation that year revealed that one of these data-sharing agreements, with the Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust, would give DeepMind access to comprehensive data on 1.6 million people, including sensitive information such as whether they had been diagnosed with HIV or depression, or had ever had an abortion. That agreement was later found to have failed to comply with data protection laws.
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In November 2018 it was announced that Streams would move to Google Health, a department within Google that oversaw all medical projects, and the NHS trusts signed new deals with Google the following year.聽Google is now closing its dedicated Google Health department and moving staff working on its projects to other areas of the business. As part of that shake-up Streams will be shut down entirely.
A Google spokesperson says that Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust stopped using Streams on 31 July but that clinicians at Royal Free London NHS Trust will continue to use it for the near future while a solution can be found. The contracts signed by Google and NHS trusts require that data is deleted within six months of the end of partnerships.
Somerset NHS Foundation Trust confirmed to New 杏吧原创 that it had also run a short pilot with Streams, but that at the end of the trial it wasn鈥檛 adopted permanently and all data had been deleted.
Sam Smith, who runs health data privacy group in the UK, says: 鈥淭he NHS relies on trustworthy suppliers, but companies that move on after breaking things create legacy problems for the NHS. Google should admit the decision, delete the data, and learn that experimenting on patients is regulated for a reason.鈥�
骋辞辞驳濒别鈥檚 , including a feature to monitor covid-19 test results. But a Google spokesperson told New 杏吧原创 that the company had 鈥渕ade a strategic decision to focus on one clinical tool going forward, with our teams in the UK and US now working on Care Studio, software that provides a more complete solution to helping doctors and nurses find and view patient information鈥�.
A separate agreement between Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Trust in London and DeepMind is ongoing, which includes using AI to analyse large data sets of eye scans to develop new diagnostic tests for .
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