The International Telecommunications Union’s Telecommunications Sector has approved Continua’s interoperability design guidelines for personal connected health as a new global standard. ITU called the move "a milestone for global e-health standardization."

ITU called the approval “an important milestone for global e-health standardization.” 

“Devices such as wireless blood pressure cuffs, weight scales and a wide range of activity trackers can play a critical role in the prevention and improved management of chronic conditions such as diabetes, hypertension and heart disease," ITU officials said in a news release. “Establishing global interoperability standards will stimulate innovation and nourish the personal connected health ecosystem. For manufacturers, standards will decrease time-to-market, reduce development costs and increase efficiencies. In particular they will enable quicker, less expensive integration to electronic medical records or health information exchange platforms.”

[See also: IEEE, Continua partner on standards.]

As a United Nations agency composed of 200 national governments and 700 private companies and organizations, the union’s approval represents a historic global show of support for Continua and interoperable personal connected health. ITU approval will encourage adoption of Continua’s standards around the world and bring new possibilities for high-quality, accessible, connected healthcare.

“ICTs are now understood to play a pivotal role in increasing efficiency and quality in delivery of healthcare, and reducing risk and suffering, particularly among the most vulnerable communities in developing countries,” Hamadoun I. Touré, Secretary-General, ITU, said in a news release. “Interoperability will be a key determinant of e-Health’s efficient and equitable rollout and so I applaud our membership for the quick approval of these key guidelines.”

"Certification according to the Continua Design Guidelines facilitates data security and is proven to significantly lower design costs and decrease integration time from three months to just three weeks," Clint McClellan said in press statement. McClellan ispresident and chair of the Continua Alliance Board of Directors and senior director of business development, Qualcomm Life

[See also: Continua developer tools now available.]

The approval covers the full spectrum of Continua’s Guidelines:

• TAN-IF: Interface between touch area network (TAN) health devices and application hosting devices (AHDs)
• PAN-IF: Interface between personal area network (PAN) health devices and AHDs
• LAN-IF: Interface between local area network (LAN) health devices and AHDs
• WAN-IF: Interface between AHDs and wide area network (WAN) health devices
• HRN-IF: Interface between WAN health devices and Health Record Network health devices