Continua Health Alliance, the organisation that encourages personal connected health by promoting device connectivity and interoperability standards, is offering its design guidelines for 2011 to developers for free. The move should reduce development costs for plug-and-play personal health solutions says the organisation.  Continua’s guidelines were previously only available to the organisation’s own membership during interoperability testing. The organisation also said its 2012 guidelines have now entered the test phase with members.

Making the 2011 guidelines free will enable vendors “to create devices that make the collection and sharing of personal health data convenient and secure for consumers and healthcare providers,” said Clint McClellan, Continua Board President and Senior Director of Strategic Marketing, Qualcomm Life, the vendor’s healthcare business.

Continua’s 2012 guidelines, which became available to members last month (March), are the first to cover products that incorporate Bluetooth version 4.0, the low-energy version of the short-range wireless technology.  The latest guidelines are currently undergoing interoperability testing by the organisation’s membership. The low power consumption of Bluetooth 4.0 makes the technology suitable for health and fitness devices, as well as monitoring systems and on-body sensors. It has been predicted that Bluetooth version 4.0 will become widely available in devices in the health sector. Continua plans a free public release for its 2012 guidelines at the end of this year.