Leading US healthcare provider Aetna has acquired Healthagen, the firm behind a popular medical app called iTriage for an undisclosed sum as it looks for ways to tie in its customers. iTriage gives users access to a range of services including finding a nearby doctor or specialist, checking their symptoms and looking up diseases. The app has been downloaded over three million times for use on Apple and Android devices.  Aetna, which will add to iTriage's features, hopes the app will make patients more engaged with their own care. The insurer has not said whether it will withdraw iTriage from the wider market following its purchase. Aetna has the option of withdrawing the app so only its customers have access to it, a strategy for boosting its own service's popularity at the expense of competitors.

The news of the acquisition was announced by Aetna president Mark Bertolini, as reported by Techcrunch.”About a month and a half ago we bought a little company called iTriage,” he said. Bertolini described the iTriage app as being “the fastest growing consumer application in healthcare today”.  He also said Aetna will release the SDK for its own iNexx healthcare app platform as a means to encourage developers to write apps for it.