Is Blockchain the Next Big Disruption in Healthcare Information Management?
On hearing the term, “blockchain”, the first thing that comes to mind is cryptocurrencies. However, cryptocurrencies are only one of the thousand possible applications for blockchain technology. Outside the fintech space, healthcare industry is one of the promising markets that are heavily investing in the blockchain technology.
The healthcare industry is ready to leverage some of the emerging technologies, including the IoT, AR, VR, wearables with improved sensors and connectivity, and blockchain, which has the ability solve healthcare problems. Specified below are some of the examples where healthcare information management systems have already started implementing blockchain in their infrastructure:
Medical Data Management
Electronic medical records are constantly leveraging blockchain technology to improve patients’ accessibility to medical documents in a more secured manner. The goal is to give patients and their healthcare providers a one-stop access to their entire medical history across all providers they have ever seen.
Drug Development and Supply Chain Integrity
Blockchain is also facilitating medical research institutes to develop new drugs by making patient results more widely accessible. This is also helping administrative bodies to decrease the volume of counterfeit drug that are presently costing the top-shelf pharmaceutical companies losses worth billions of dollars annually.
Data Security
In the last three years, according to Protenus Breach Barometer report, “Approximately 140 million patient’s medical history was breached.” The unprecedented growth of IoT and Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) is putting excessive pressure of healthcare IT to keep their infrastructure and systems well protected. These technology solutions have the capacity to become the infrastructure that is needed for healthcare organizations to keep health data secure while reaping the benefits of connected medical devices.
What more does the future hold for blockchain-enabled healthcare information management is only for the time to test now.
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