The Gimlet Eye gazes at the swoony coverage of IMS Health’s Allergy Alert now on Ford cars enabled with SYNC AppLink. How did owners of iPhone and iPad (the only ones who can SYNC this up) ever live without continuous local (GPS driven) pollen count, allergen conditions, the risk of flu, asthma and cold, plus the UV index available while in the car on your very say-so? (Gimlet generally uses leading indicators such as Eye scratchiness, sneezing, observing the dust color on the hood/bonnet, and for UV, arm out the window.) Now in May 2011, Ford announced their intent to connect telehealth into the SYNC system as ‘the car that cares’ announced at January’s CES, and naturally, per Ford’s release, Allergy Alert is positioned as the first bit of caring. But the watchful Eye does note that much has been made of SYNC-ing to more ‘vital’ indicators such as blood glucose and heart rate. Gimlety Observation: if we are going to add to the present state of onboard complexity and distractions (beyond auto vitals, a decent sound system and perhaps traffic alerts), can we stay with the ‘need to know’ information? It would have been far more powerful for Ford to announce in a few months actual telehealth monitoring, key to personal safety, than this light-as-pollen app. Ford shifts gears to mHealth (HealthcareITNews)