Apple hired the director of Standford Medicine's digital health Dr. Sumbul Desai in June 2017 to work on health services for Apple Watch. Desai had led a groundbreaking telemedicine project that involved Apple Watch. Today a new interview with Dr. Desai has surfaced where we get to learn a little more about Apple's health strategy without giving away and trade secrets of what's next from the company.  

MobiHealthNews had the opportunity this week to sit down with one of the top Cupertino executives who is technically the VP of Apple's heath services.

The first question was about how Doctors were responding to Apple Watch ECG feature. The reporter noted that "When it was first announced, there was some pushback from doctors thinking 'Are we going to get all of these people off the street who think they have a-fib and they don’t?'

That question is supported by a Patently Apple report posted in December titled "Doctor Warns Apple Watch 4 users to be Careful with the new ECG App not always being accurate." The testimony of Dr. Kolski was his personal experience of having panicked patients emailing him thinking they had a dire heart problem according Apple's EGC reading that in most cases were false alarms. Causing doctors more problems dealing with false alarms isn't good for Apple.

Dr. Desai didn't want to really anwser that question and stated that it's anecdotal, so not much great data. Desai further noted that doctor's biggest frustration isn’t around so much getting the ECG, because they’ve found that helpful, but it’s that the health systems are still figuring out the right way to handle that type of incoming.

Desia's reply shows that Apple may already be well aware of the reaction from patients burdening doctors and that they may already be at work to find a solution to that problem.

Desai tried to change the subject by touting the company's line that it's helping to save lives as Tim Cook's messaging on this topic has been for months backed by a series of Apple Videos on this matter like the one below.

The MobiHealthNews reporter Jonah Comstock then shifted gears a bit by stating that he thought that on the consumer side, the ECG was the thing everyone’s excited about but when talking to doctors, Health Records is where they see the real change that Apple is inspiring. So how do those two pieces fit together?

Dr. Desai response was that the two projects fit together. By putting the ECG in someone’s hand and having the PDF [file] designed for the physician to review, it's  really a new way for patients to engage with their physician in a different way.

Dr. Desai added that Similarly with Health Records — and we’re really proud of what the team has done with the VA recently as well — Health Records now allows you to have all of your records, if you go to different systems in particular, in one place.

Desai also talked about a project relating to health records that can quickly tell an ER doctor what your medications are. Apple offers "Health Records" App today and a recent patent tell us that there's more on this in the works relating to a cooperative health management system. A few of the screenshots of that system are presented below.

With regards to the FDA, Desai stated that "we have been working with them for years and we have developed a relationship. … So we have a good relationship with the FDA. However, they held us to task. I mean, they asked us really hard questions and, given the size and impact we had, were very critical of our products and making sure that we’re doing the right thing and thinking about the user first and the customer’s safety first — which they should do.

They have an incredibly hard job and I think we’re very respectful of the job they have and we have found them to be very thoughtful in their thinking about these technologies and what’s the right way to innovate, but also maintain the customer’s and patient’s safety." The Apple Watch ECG app was granted a De Novo Classification by the FDA prior to its launch. For more on MobiHealthNews interview with Dr. Desai click here.

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