Dr. Google Google has joined the Mayo Clinic, quietly signaling a powerful disruption for all of medicine.

Back in 1997 I wrote: The information age is to medicine as the Protestant Reformation was to the Catholic Church. The Church didnt disappear when information once held tightly by the priesthood became widely available, but religion changed forever.

My search engine, the doctor

In that context, Mayos agreement to produceclinical summaries under itsnamefor common Google medical searchesis like a medieval pope happily handing out Bible translations. The mission of the most-used search engine on the planet is to make the worlds information universally accessible and useful. Mayo, in contrast, has for decades been a global symbol of doctor-knows-best. Recommending a Google search as the first stop for those needing health information, in the words of a Mayo physician executive, represents a true paradigm change.

But theres much more going on here than search. From the Fitbit to medicines front lines, information technology is forcing a new doctor-patient relationship with new rules for new roles.

If information is power, digitized information is distributed power. While patient-centered care has been directed by professionals towards patients, collaborative health what some call participatory medicine or person-centric care shifts the perspective from the patient outwards.

Collaboration means sharing. At places like Mayo and Houstons MD Anderson Cancer Center, the doctors detailed notes, long seen only by other clinicians, are available through a mobile app for patients to see when they choose and share how they wish. mHealth makes the process mundane, while the content makes it an utterly radical act.

About 5 million patients nationwide currently have electronic access to open notes. Bostons Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and a few other institutions are planning to allow patients to make additions and corrections to what they call OurNotes. Not surprisingly, many doctors remain mortified by this medical sacrilege. Even more threatening is an imminent deluge of patient-generated health data churned out by a growing list of products from major consumer companies. Sensors are being incorporated into wearables, watches, smartphones and (in a Ford prototype) even a car that cares with biometric sensors in the seat and steering wheel. Sitting in your suddenly becomes telemedicine.

To be sure, traditional information channels remain. For example, a doctor-prescribed, Food and Drug Administration-approved app uses sensors and personalized analytics to prevent severe asthma attacks. Increasingly common, though, is digitized data that doesnt need a doctor at all. For example, a Microsoft fitness band not only provides constant heart rate monitoring, according to a New York Times review, but is part of a health platform employing algorithms to deliver actionable information and contextual analysis. By comparison, Dr. Google belongs in a Norman Rockwell painting.

These participative technologies have helped supercharge online patient communities, which by one estimate include about one in five Americans with a common chronic condition. Peer-to-Peer health care, as Pew calls it, has helped turn self-reported symptoms and therapeutic responses into crowd-sourced data points. Peers can also point the way to tools such as a consumer version of a sophisticated symptom checker or a medical-grade calculator of surgical risk. The aging of digital natives will only accelerate this trend.

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How Mayo's "Dr. Google" Deal Disrupts Medicine