A blockchain system for healthcare

Abstract

This paper analyses the impact of the digital transformation on the healthcare sector and investigates the opportunities of using blockchain technologies in the healthcare ecosystem. The main goal is the proposition of a blockchain system for healthcare that will improve the tracking of business transactions, real-time communication and data sharing between stakeholders. The proposed system will enable the recording of all data and transactions of healthcare providers, medical laboratories, academia, research institutes and laboratories, companies, health insurance companies and investors, government and state authorities, and patients. All stakeholders’ transactions will be done using a blockchain network and all collected data will be stored in a cloud database. Patients will have a blockchain application that will enable managing electronic personal health record, electronic health records, medical reports, electronic prescriptions, health insurance data, and crowdsensing data. Using blockchain application, patients can interact with their doctors through online conversations and distributes their personal health data reports. This approach encourages telemedicine services and is suitable for monitoring patients’ health status and online access to all their health data. For tracking patients’ health status different crowdsensing applications can be used, such as monitoring heart rate, blood pressure, stress, etc. The proposed system could serve as a good basis for the adoption of blockchain for healthcare in different countries.