Blockchain is expected to achieve new standards for electronic medical records interoperability

Rage Comment : The inability to transfer patient medical records in various hospital systems has caused great trouble for patients and hospital management, which is also a common healthcare problem in the world. Investment company Ark Invest and blockchain startup Gem jointly released a survey report, pointing out that blockchain is expected to improve the interoperability of electronic medical records. The white paper elaborates on the commonalities and docking methods of blockchain and healthcare systems in a relatively detailed manner, hoping that this solution can meet the expectations of both doctors and patients for the interoperability of electronic medical records.

Translation: Annie_Xu

Ark Invest and Gem jointly released a survey report, "How Blockchain Technology Can Enhance EHR Operability", which explores in depth how to achieve a modern electronic medical record (EHR) that is universal across the healthcare industry. The report pointed out that the design and implementation of a high-quality electronic medical record infrastructure can share protected medical information with authorized agencies, allowing healthcare providers to better communicate with patients, make more accurate and efficient diagnosis and treatment, and simplify workflows in real time.

Ark Invest is an investment company dedicated to technological innovation, such as robotics, machine learning, blockchain, cloud computing, energy storage, and DNA sequencing. Gem is a blockchain application developer covering payment, healthcare, supply chain, logistics, property rights, and digital property management.

The two companies jointly published an article arguing that information in today's healthcare industry is not only private, but also unique.

"Although both doctors and patients are eager to achieve unified digital medical records, the current infrastructure cannot meet the requirements. A fully interoperable medical system is not yet possible due to the insecurity and opacity of traditional data sharing channels. The old information channels make its upper-level software programs unable to adapt to technological upgrades, just like a high-speed train cannot run on rusty rails from the 19th century."

A strong and flexible sharing and interoperability architecture is needed to enable real-time access to EHRs and high security against unauthorized or malicious users; these important issues can be addressed through blockchain technology.

“The potential of blockchain technology in healthcare is becoming increasingly clear, perhaps primarily in enabling interoperability of EHRs.”

“We believe blockchain technology can improve three key features of EHR systems: document authenticity to ensure immutability, data access management to ensure network security, and joint version control to ensure interoperability.”

"There is a lot of electronic data now, and blockchain technology can manage these data entries. Only when the participants reach a consensus can they be recorded and verified. Blockchain can provide doctors with a unified case data identifier, and other authorized data sources and medical team members can refer to it."

"Patients can monitor their personal medical information, share or veto data changes, and ensure high privacy and participation. Researchers can also obtain more authentic and reliable data and build a trusted platform for sharing data. Taxpayers can unify data, reduce the probability of errors and fraud, reduce management and claims processing costs, and extend medical services to underserved markets."

The white paper lists proof-of-concept blockchain applications that can increase the authenticity, network security, and interoperability of EHR systems. These proof-of-concept applications are based on GemOS, a blockchain operating system developed by Gem, which can provide infrastructure to enable information acquisition, query, programming, recording, and verification on the blockchain. GemOS belongs to Gem Health, a recently launched network that uses blockchain technology to develop healthcare applications and general architecture. The launch of Gem Health and the impact of distributed ledgers on the healthcare industry are increasing.

For example, the blockchain ledger in the proof of concept EHR is a shared information entry for events and information. The blockchain application is interconnected with GemOS and then connected to the underlying ledger to realize a regulatory information exchange network, integrating patients, taxpayers and healthcare service providers into the network.

GemOS

The white paper points out that GemOS contains four elements: logic, data, and network.

“The network interacts directly with the blockchain; the logic comes from the blockchain and interacts with the application, just like the Internet has a data transmission infrastructure and a software stack that ensures that general applications can access this data; GemOS provides a software stack to obtain information from the blockchain, and then patients, taxpayers, and providers can access this information through healthcare applications.”

Ark Invest and Gem white papers emphasize that data is not stored on the blockchain. The blockchain only records the minimum amount of information required to verify the content and provide data retrieval.

"Blockchain technology makes it possible to achieve a trusted, interoperable architecture. It can share healthcare information using a decentralized architecture, which is different from past solutions. Compared with centralized solutions, this decentralized architecture is tamper-proof and flexible, and can ensure the security and immutability of healthcare information."