Microsoft's secret weapon against Google: Health search

Microsoft won't ever catch Google in general Internet search, but today it launched a new Bing health search that could pay big dividends in the long run. It's a winner, and far superior to anything of Google's. It may give Microsoft a leg up in the coming war over who gives you control over your medical records.

You don't need to do anything special when you get to Bing to use the new search tool. Just type in a health term, such as "high blood pressure." You'll find, just underneath related ads, a summary of information about the term, and a group of excellent, well-organized, useful links, provided by a partner --- and every time I searched, the links were provided by the well-known Mayo Clinic. Alain Rappaport, Microsoft’s General Manager of Health Search, has more details in his blog.

You can see Bing's health search in action, below.

Try the same thing in Google, and you'll just see the usual search results. Bing is hands-down far more useful. True, Google has a separate Google Health page for health searches that is useful as well. But who wants to go to a separate search site for doing a health search? The information there is also not as well organized.

Today, Bing's superiority might not mean much. But health-related searches will only grow over time, particularly with an aging population. And even more important than health search itself is where the real dollars will be: In a simple-to-use electronic medical records system for consumers. Google and Microsoft are both at work on such a system right now. The systems are designed to hold all of your medical information, including prescriptions, medical history and so on, so that it's right at your fingertips and under your control. For you, it will be quite useful. For Google or Microsoft, the revenue possibilities are enormous. (The privacy implications, though, are frightening.)

Neither Microsoft nor Google does a particular good job with their consumer medical records sites yet. Microsoft HealthVault is slightly superior to Google Health because it appears to have more sites from which you can automatically grab health information, such as pharmacies. But at this point, neither is particularly useful.

At some point that will change, and many people will manage their health records over the Internet. Whichever company lets them do that will reap enormous profits. If Bing maintains its superiority over Google in health search, Microsoft will drive more people to its service. And that can have a very big payoff.