Healthcare as an industry is yet to explore the full potential of blockchain

Srinivas Mahankali, Chief Business Officer, Blockedge Technologies in an interaction with Express Healthcare explains about the importance of implementing blockchain technology in EHR

Explain us the state of medical records today

The inherent complexities and huge volume of medical records have strained healthcare professionals for decades. With Electronic Health Records (EHR) saving costs and reducing errors, paper-based health record system does not hold any merit anymore. However, the existing EHRs have failed to live up to expectations, and instead, they have turned out to be a leading cause of physician burnout for healthcare professionals. This comes from a variety of issues linked to these systems in general and the amount of time needed for data entry. Poor-quality documentation, enormous time consumed, template-based reporting, and lack of cohesion between the systems make the current EHR system complicated.

What are the challenges in balancing medical privacy with ease of access?

EHR makes records accessible at the click of a button. However, one worrying factor is medical privacy and the widespread perception about compromising personal medical data. This is more important at a time when easily available electronic data is used for business purposes. The challenge is to ensure privacy. EHR needs to have adhered to existing privacy laws which are distinct from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. To address this challenge, Blockchain is a vital solution, with its inherent traits, blockchain enables data security, tamper-proofing, immutability, and irreversible without consent while providing utmost accessibility to all participants in the network. Healthcare as an industry is yet to understand and explore the full potential of Blockchain, this innovative technology is set to revolutionise, and in the same way, it is making a positive impact across other sectors.

Even though EHRs have failed to live up to expectations, why does it remain the central tool for capturing the plethora of new streams of data generated through health care?

Despite the challenges and shortcomings, EHR remains the central tool. This is increasingly influencing clinical practice and pharma trials. However, on the other hand, EHR vendors have been sued for selling non-functioning products to hospitals and accused of acts of fraud. Though EHRs improved safety in some areas, they also introduce new risks in the system. This is where the benefits of blockchain technology are frequently discussed and there is widespread agreement that its role could transform across all technology touchpoints starting from the drug development and the supply chain, clinical trials management, the delivery of healthcare to patients and much more.

And now, finally, there is a compelling reason for Blockchain’s implementation in EHR, this would give doctors and nurses control over the flow of information from a single, trusted source. All concerned participants of the network would be able to see the same data, and every update would be visible to the whole network almost immediately. This implies that medical teams can trust that what they learn about a patient through Blockchain EHR is both accurate and is up to date.

We have come across many troubling problems with the current EHR system, which became the basis for few lawsuits across the globe. How does Blockchain address the new systemic risks in this industry?

The interoperability of the EHR system is another major concern for the healthcare industry. Blockchain could facilitate nationwide/global-wide interoperability of electronic health records, which would allow healthcare providers to access patients’ medical histories, current medications, and prior imaging studies. According to one study, the complete interoperability of EHR could save the US healthcare system $77.8 billion per year. Data sharing or Health Information Exchange (HIE) is an important aspect of EHR systems, this allows the free flowing of information, without any hurdle and creates opportunities for the exchange of information and makes it usable for further purposes. Integration of blockchain technology could easily address the down point of several EHR systems being deployed in various hospitals, with varying levels of terminologies, technical, and functional capabilities which make them have not universally defined standards could be easily rectified.

How can blockchain revolutionise medical records and save lives?

With blockchain technology, we can create a database of symptoms and treatments for more accurate patient diagnosis. At the present, patients with rare illnesses or symptoms are dependent on local hospitals and medical practitioners. If a healthcare provider is not familiar with a patient’s symptoms or has never dealt with the illness before, their treatment is subjected to the limitations of lack of knowledge and experience. But with blockchain technology we can a central database of the medical histories of patients, doctors across the globe could access and search through comprehensive records of symptoms, diagnoses, treatments, and outcomes all with one click of a button. For patients with unusual or rare symptoms, this means more accurate, efficient, and effective treatment.

Does this innovative technology be effective in reducing human effort and time spent on spent on data entry?

To a certain extent, it is possible as the blockchain is a distributed ledger with the participation of many stakeholders and sharing of data in a secure, transparent, and accurate way. The collection of data is also thus distributive in nature. Moreover, Blockchain can work well with other technologies. This technology can be integrated with Medical Document Automation Solutions, which uses state-of-the-art public cloud artificial intelligence and machine learning to recognise and extract and digitise healthcare information from documents, faxes, and narrative from physical paper-oriented reports. Such extracted reports can directly be stored and shared on the blockchain network for easy and secure accessibility.

Will Blockchain be effective in providing more control into the hands of patients and ensure greater level of privacy?

As explained before, privacy is a critical concern. Blockchain technology, being a distributed ledger, ensures and handovers most of the control to the patients, and cryptographic techniques provide a greater level of privacy. The access could be controlled only by the users and trusted care providers with the help of blockchain. Thus, to a great extent, the decision-making is done by the patient.

With standard platform accessible in the future to healthcare professionals, will blockchain open the door to an overall better healthcare system?

Like in many other sectors, blockchain will ensure a better result in the healthcare too. Apart from greater control on the data, the way consent is given for trials and treatment will be changed thoroughly in favour of the patients. Thus, both the drug development and therapeutic aspects of healthcare will be improved a lot with the help of blockchain which again ensures safety and security. Apart from that, it could also ease the monetary transactions between the patients and the care providers.