Blockchain and its

application in real world.

-KHUSHI SACHDEV, KAPIL SINGH
CSE
2100290100087,2100290100082

Abstract:-
Blockchain is an emerging technology being applied for
creating innovative solutions in various sectors, including healthcare.
Blockchain technology moves in the direction of persistent revolution
and change. Patients and healthcare practitioners are faced with the
challenge of accessing, managing, integrating, and sharing health
records securely. The replication mechanism, and privacy and security
features of blockchain have a promising future in the healthcare
domain as they can solve some of the inherent issues of the health
management system .Patients should be able to manage their health
records anywhere in the world, keep track of medical background, give
access to data, and share those with any healthcare professional
securely. Direct access to data for patients and a more robust data-
sharing infrastructure could better prepare the healthcare system to
manage public health threats during the emergence of deadly disease
outbreak such as COVID-19. Blockchain technology built over the
Internet has the potential to use the data into peer -to -peer and
interoperable manner by using patient centric and eliminating third
party approach. This paper conducted a literature review to find out
the pivotal roles blockchain technology play in solving some of the most
critical and challenging issues facing the healthcare industry. This
summary identifies the various sectors where blockchain technology
can be implemented in healthcare and summarizes all the details
related to it.

Introduction:-
One of the fields where blockchain is considered to have great
potential
is healthcare. To transform healthcare, the focus should be given to
the
management of data that could benefit from the potential to
connect disparate systems and increase the accuracy of EHRs.
Blockchain
technology can be used to support drug prescriptions and supply
chain
management, pregnancy and any risk data management as well as to
support access control, data sharing and managing of an audit trail of
medical activities. Other healthcare areas that can benefit from
blockchain technology are provider credentials, medical billing,
contracting, medical record exchange, clinical trials, and anti-
counterfeiting drugs. Healthcare services are transforming to enable
patient-centric approach. Blockchain-based healthcare systems could
enhance security and reliability of patients’ data since patients would
have control over their healthcare records. Those systems could also
help consolidate patient data, enabling the exchange of medical
records
across different healthcare institutions.
A blockchain is a type of Digital Ledger Technology that consists of
growing list of records called blocks, that are securely linked together
using cryptography. Each block contains a cryptographic hash of the
previous block, a timestamp, and transaction data. The timestamp
proves that the transaction data existed when the block was created.
Since each block contains information about the block previous to it,
they effectively form a chain, with each additional block linking to
the
ones before it. Consequently, blockchain transactions are irreversible
in
that, once they are recorded, the data in any given block cannot be
altered retroactively without altering all subsequent blocks. In
Blockchain, data are maintained on networks instead of a central
database, improving stability and showing its proneness to be hacked
thus it serves to demonstrate that the data is actual and unchanged.
The security of the blockchain is implemented using cryptographic
keys, a distributed network and a network servicing protocol by
recording information in a block. Once information (e.g.
a transaction request) is validated, data is recorded in a block and
cannot be disputed, removed or altered without the knowledge and
permission of those who created the record as well as the network.
When a block is added to the chain of other blocks it remains
unchanged.

Existing healthcare data systems have several limitations, including

patients’ privacy, data integrity, quality, and accuracy, since
blockchain
is a distributed ledger network that adds and never deletes or
modifies
records without a common consensus & ensures that data is not
processed in any centralised venue, making it accessible and
accountable to all network users. This decentralised system avoids a
single attack, strengthening and securing the system. It facilitates
better
control of health records and patient care by minimising twice the
amount of medical practice and monitoring, saving both
practitioners
and patients time and resources. The patient will watch where their
information goes and achieve it by keeping health records on a
blockchain.
Blockchain will also help marketers to maintain an overview of the
products used in medicine. Health and pharmaceuticals will get rid of
counterfeit medications using Blockchain technologies, enabling
tracing
of all these medicines. It helps discover the cause of falsification.
Now we will review how Blockchain will help in removing the existing
problem in healthcare.

1.Data sharing and

interoperability
The Health Information and Management Systems Society
defines interoperability as “the ability of different information
technology systems and software applications to communicate,
exchange data, and use the information that has been
exchanged”.
Medical records are digitally stored in a centralized IT system that
makes sharing difficult. Requesting, sending, receiving, and
compiling patient data is tedious, time-consuming, and costly.
Medical records are digitally stored in a centralized IT system that
makes sharing difficult. Requesting, sending, receiving, and
compiling patient data is tedious, time-consuming, and costly.
Blockchain technology could make the process of sharing
healthcare data significantly easier and can help end the
interoperability problem in the healthcare industry. In the
permissioned healthcare blockchain, the patients are identified via
their hash ID, which will be their unique identifier. The hashing
allows the ID to be unique and secures the privacy of the user.
Patients would oversee sharing the decryption key for their own
associated blocks of data with their chosen healthcare provider(s).
It enhances security, privacy, interoperability, and could put
patients at the centre of the ecosystem. Patients and providers
would greatly benefit from accurate, up-to-date, and
comprehensive medical records. Some blockchain-based EMR
applications include Medblock and BlockHIE . MedBlock
provides a mechanism for a record search. The proposed system
maintains the address of blocks containing the records of a patient,
grouped by a healthcare provider or department. Each patient
inventory contains a reference to the corresponding record on the
blockchain. BlocHIE proposed by Jiang et al. where they present a
healthcare platform based on blockchain technology.

2.Clinical Trials
Clinical trials, a method of testing a new drug and its effectiveness
in a controlled environment, produce tons of data. The process is
expensive, takes a few years to complete, and not without fraud. It
is crucial to have a transparent solution that lets anyone review the
clinical reports and ensure that the results of the trial are not
tampered with. Blockchain can be a great technology to facilitate
clinical trials by providing data integrity, and the authenticity of the
documents needs to be verified. The distributed network ensures
that no data can be modified without authorized access.
3. Public Health
health outcomes of specific groups of people. Population health,
the analysis of health outcomes of large groups of people, is
becoming an effective and increasingly utilized tool in efforts to
treat widespread health problems, promote good health practices,
and discourage drug and alcohol abuse. Affordable Care Act (ACA)
promoted concepts that are essential to population health: a team
approach to better coordinating care in practices and among
providers, and care that is focused on engaging patients and
providing better quality. Without such a robust population health
record system that would instantly give relevant organizations the
information they need about potential outbreaks, it is difficult to
perform the analytics solutions that are needed to map the impact
of and behaviour of the COVID-19 outbreak. Blockchain could play
an important role in the success of public healthcare initiatives.
With the help of distributed ledger technology, the blockchain
proactively promotes collaboration of various parties involved and
facilitate deep insights into vital healthcare trends.

4. Blockchain for data security

Blockchain can provide several advantages for healthcare data
security and identity management. It can curb threats and keeps
private data out of the wrong hands. Blockchain encrypts data when
added to the chain and make it immutable and impossible to
decipher. It authorizes transactions with a private identification
key, known only to the individual. Thus, unlike the healthcare data
technology of today, a healthcare provider would be able to access a
patient’s medical data only with explicit access to the blockchain
record. Better data collaboration between providers increases the
probability of an accurate diagnosis and the likelihood of successful
treatments and enables healthcare facilities to deliver cost-effective
care. Blockchain can keep patient information safe and secure while
still enable them to share it with any service providers of their
choice. It provides proof of ownership of medical records, and
guarantee authenticity for anti-counterfeiting techniques.

5.In counterfeiting drugs

A blockchain based drug supply chain will depend on having all
the required entities like the manufacturer, distributors, and
pharmacist or hospital on a trusted network powered by
blockchain. A visible supply chain, which includes all stakeholders
like suppliers, vendors, distributors and partners, is created when
drug bottles are labelled with serial numbers and packages
containing these serial numbers are scanned and recorded on the
blockchain at every point along its journey from factory to
pharmacy. In fact, even manufacturing inputs, like chemical
ingredients can be tracked and linked to the finished products.
Mechanism for the same is:

Step-1: A block is created upon the invention of a new medicine or

medical care which includes patent protection and a long process of
clinical trials. This information is recorded in the digital
ledger as a form of transaction
Step-2: Once the clinical trial is successful, the patent is sent to the
manufacturing plant for test prototype and mass production. Every
product has its own unique identity that is integrated with another
transaction or blockchain is including other relevant information
Step-3: Once the mass production along with packaging is finished,
medicine is gathered in a warehouse for future distribution.
Information such as, time, lot number, barcode, expiry date are
included in the blockchain.
Step-4: Transportation information is also included in the
blockchain which may include time out from one warehouse (IN) to
other, mode of transportation, authorized agent,
and other information.
Step-5: A third-party distribution network is normally responsible
for distributing drugs and medical supplies to healthcare providers or
retailers. A warehouse (OUT) for each third party is used for this
purpose from where all distribution endpoints are linked. A separate
transaction is also integrated into the blockchain.
Step-6: Care providers such as hospitals, or clinics need to provide
information, for example batch, product number or any IOT number.

6. Health Insurance Claims:-

Health Insurance claims are one of healthcare fields that can benefit
from blockchain’s immutability, transparency and auditability of data
stored on it.
While Healthcare insurance claim processing is an important area
where blockchain has potentials. However prototypes
implementations of such systems are very limited. We can find MI
Store a blockchain-based medical insurance system that provides
medical insurance industry with encrypted and immutably stored
medical insurance data.

7.Treatment Optimization :-
The number of medical patients has increased dramatically in many
countries, making it increasingly difficult for patients to obtain direct
help from doctors or nursing staff. Telemedicine technology is seen
as
a way to achieve equitable and cost-effective medical care. The
development and popularization of Internet of Things equipment
and
other remote patient monitoring systems have led to security risks in
the transmission and recording of data transactions. Based on the
characteristics of blockchain tamper-proof, anonymous, and
transparency, the intelligent contract of the blockchain can be used
to
promote the security analysis and management of medical sensors.
For example, in Medical Chain, a smart contract has been launched
through which patients can let doctors remotely review medical
cases
and provide suggestions or second opinions. In addition, the data can
be safely transmitted through blockchain asymmetric cryptographic
encryption and the drug research and development institutions
classify the data after user authorization, so as to conduct drug-
targeted research and development.

Conclusion:-
Studies have shown that blockchain has many healthcare use
cases including the management of electronic medical records
drugs and pharmaceutical supply chain management, biomedical
research and education, remote patient monitoring, health data
analytics, among others. A number of blockchain-based healthcare
applications have been developed as prototypes based on
emerging blockchain paradigms, such as smart contracts,
permissioned blockchain, off-chain storage, etc. However, more
research still needs to be conducted to better understand,
characterize and evaluate the utility of blockchain technology in
healthcare. Further research is also needed to supplement ongoing
efforts to address the challenges of scalability, latency,
interoperability, security and privacy in relation to the use of
blockchain technology in healthcare.

Reference:
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0021X#:~:text=A%20Blockchain%20network%20is%20used,ones%20i
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3. https://www.forbesindia.com/blog/technology/how-blockchain-
can-help-fight-counterfeit-drugs-in-india/
4.https://www.researchgate.net/publication/332215097_Blockc
5. https://journal.acs.org.au/index.php/ajis/article/view/2203/