To meet a rising demand, Google plans to begin increasing and improving the health-related information available to users who search for medical information.
According to Google, one out of every 20 searches on the search engine is for healthcare-related information.
In light on this data, Google plans to incorporate better search results with information cards and its iconic Knowledge Graph panels for more than 400 specific medical conditions and health issues. The project is already underway, as Google has begun working with healthcare professionals, medical illustrators and institutions such as the Mayo Clinic to get the most in-depth information available.
The information will be made available first in the United States through the Google app, available through Android and iOS, on mobile devices and on desktop computers.
According to the report, Google is using the enhanced medical search to spotlight mobile access to the information.
The veracity of medical information, which prompted Google’s effort, is paramount, and Google has said that on average, up to 11.1 medical professionals have already reviewed the information set to be released.
“We worked with a team of medical doctors (led by our own Dr. Kapil Parakh, M.D., MPH, Ph.D.) to carefully compile, curate, and review this information. All of the gathered facts represent real-life clinical knowledge from these doctors and high-quality medical sources across the web, and the information has been checked by medical doctors at Google and the Mayo Clinic, for accuracy,” according to Google’s blog.
By providing users with more information, Google believes that people can become better informed about specific conditions, and they can use the information to ask better questions of their own primary care physicians.
By making this push, Google may encourage other third-party information providers to improve and enhance the medical information they make available, empowering people by giving them up-to-date information and helping to weed out websites that provide inaccurate or out-of-date medical information.
