Subsidized Apple Watch
U.S. health insurer, Aetna Inc. said that it would offer discounts of the Apple smartwatch, marking the first deal made by the tech giant with an insurer. The US insurance giant has announced that Apple will exclusively provide its Watch, iPad and iPhone products to Atena for fitness tracking programs. As a part of this project, Atena will subsidized Apple Watch for select customers.
“We are incredibly excited to use iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch to create simple, intuitive and personalized technology solutions that will transform the health and wellness experience for our members,” said Mark Bertolini, Aetna Chairman and CEO. “This is only the beginning – we look forward to using these tools to improve health outcomes and help more people achieve more healthy days.”
Image Credit: Apple
The insurer will give some customers and employees discounts on smartwatch so that incentives from the insurance industry could boost sales of the wearable device. Aetna is going to offer subsidized Apple Watch for select large employers as well as individual customers. Also, about 50,000 Aetna employees will be receiving the smartwtach at no cost at all.
Health Apps
This is the first time that an organization directly related to health care is putting a smartwatch in front of their programs. It is aimed to make their customers and employees healthier. Aetna will offer subsidized Apple Watch with monthly payroll deductions. Not only this, as a part of the program, it will be launching iOS-exclusive health apps. These apps aim at helping consumers through health events such as prescription medication or a new diagnosis. It also integrates with Apple Wallet to allow consumers to check their deductible. The apps will be ready and starting covering Apple Watches in early 2017.
Image Credit: Apple
ResearchKit Program
Apple also has a ResearchKit program where the scientists relate heart-rate and other health data to heart disease and other maladies.
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