Could health care benefit from blockchain technology?

Interest in using blockchain technology in the health care sector continues to increase. Most recently, a federal agency is asking for white papers on the use of blockchain technology in the health care field and for health research.

The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, has asked for these white papers as part of a competition in which winners can present their papers at an upcoming industrywide workshop co-hosted with the National Institute of Standards and Technology.

This outreach illustrates growing governmental interest in blockchain technology. Basically, blockchains are data structures that can be signed and time-stamped using “a private key to prevent tampering,” according to the announcement in the Federal Register.

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It also shows that issues of privacy and access to data may arise as blockchain technology is used for such health-related fields as portable electronic health records. There clearly is potential use of the technology for these records, experts say.

“Potentially, it would give users much more control over who has a right to access data and at what point in time,” Christian Catalini, a professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Sloan School of Management, said.

For instance, patients could revoke access to electronic health records to a provider if providers are switched, Catalini said. As a result, providers would only be given temporary access to these patient records.

Privacy potential

Blockchain technology would be useful, too, as in the next few years, electronic health records could become portable among institutions and providers. These records may detail many attributes about patients and list various personal identifying information.

It would also allow health data to be given to researchers who need temporary access while doing a medical/health study. There also can be access to fitness trackers and data that could be analyzed.