The Problem
In today's world, almost every industry relies on the near-instantaneous and secure transfer of data between parties. Many of these industries, especially the financial sector, have adopted new technologies like blockchain to keep up with the demand for instant, secure transfer of information. In contrast, the healthcare industry has done nothing of the sort and still relies on legacy systems which are burdensome, slow, and more often than not vulnerable to attack. Healthcare information cannot be shared efficiently or safely with the current electronic health record systems, and often times physicians and patients must spend vast amounts of time filling out forms, verifying identities, and ensuring that privacy and security standards are met. Furthermore, there are often various formats and standards across different systems, resulting in more time wasted dealing with the information instead of helping the patient. The result of the current system is a fragmentation of data where each stakeholder has their own copy of what they believe to be correct, but there is no single version of the truth. Finally, current electronic health record systems use centralized databases which only increases the security risk and requires trust to be put in a single authority.
What The Solution Should Look Like
In order to solve these problems we need a new healthcare IT system that runs on a platform capable of allowing interoperability, safe storage of all the data, and secure, efficient exchange of that data between stakeholders. We need the technology to allow for decentralized peer-to-peer interactions that can also be verified and recorded without a need for a central authority. This clearly sounds like a job for blockchain technology.
The Tech That Can Do It
Blockchains, at their core, are a network of peers that manage a shared database that it distributed to every member of that network. This shared database is referred to as a distributed ledger. These blockchains use complex, cryptographic algorithms to keep records of everything that happens in the network and make sure that the ledger is not tampered with, and if it is, it is not included in the blockchain. This is of course perfect for many processes that occur daily in the healthcare system; the auditing of information and verification of identities are two common examples. Blockchain technology would allow for physicians to share data across the entire globe and do so securely and quickly. There is no one central authority to be hacked, and there aren't 5 different versions of the same patient's medical history. It's all right there on the blockchain.
The biggest challenge of this of course is getting hospitals to adopt this new technology and switch from using the legacy systems they currently rely upon. Perhaps blockchain technology could be integrated with the current legacy systems, giving us a half-solution? Let me know what you guys think in the comments down below and thanks for reading!
Stay curious,
Karlson Schlyer