Bradley Merrill Thompson, a Member of the Health Care and Life Sciences practice in the Washington, DC office, was quoted in an article titled “As Apple Moves into Health Apps, What Happens to Privacy?”
Following is an excerpt:
Health-data experts have pointed to a worrisome trend of consumers using apps for self-diagnosis. For example, a heart-rate device for pregnant women, or an app that helps consumers determine whether a mole may be skin cancer, may cause patients to skip doctor visits.
Apple has said it won’t collect data from apps that patients use to make such diagnoses, but many of these apps exist in a regulatory gray area, by marketing themselves as tools that aren’t diagnostic even when consumers are using them that way, said Bradley Merrill Thompson, an attorney specializing in medical devices at Epstein, Becker & Green P.C. “We have a significant segment of this consumer-facing market that is not strictly regimented for privacy and security,” McGraw said.
Apple’s entrance into the market could make it more mainstream, and potentially explode some of the underlying problems.
