FROM SHARING TO SELLING: CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES OF ESTABLISHING A DIGITAL HEALTH DATA MARKETPLACE USING BLOCKCHAIN TECHNOLOGIES

Moving Beyond Proof of Concept and Pilots to Mainstream: Discovery and Lessons from a Reference Framework and Implementation

Blockchain technology is a radical innovation with the potential to disrupt and re-imagine more collaborative established business structures and processes. Significant advances, particularly in the payments space, include newer, faster, and less costly options for moving money. The underlying blockchain technology can be used for broader use cases spanning several verticals, including healthcare - although its adoption here is less than complete. Numerous proofs-of-concept and pilots have been executed and are increasing, although enterprise blockchain applications in healthcare at the production scale enabling transformative constituent processes are limited. In this article, the authors analyze the blockchain in healthcare literature for critical success factors and add practitioner views on crossing the chasm from proof-of-concept and pilots to a transformational scale. We explore 24 articles for key inflections for scale and highlight the need for a multifaceted execution framework to resolve the practical barriers to enabling reimagined network-based blockchain use cases for efficiencies, particularly in disparate health systems such as the U.S. In addition, we introduce the blockchain discovery framework to make this emerging technology meet the mainstream operations at scale systematically and in a stair-stepped and future-proofed manner, addressing practical stakeholder concerns. Finally, the authors present a reference case study discovered through the framework of one such healthcare administrative process for a scaled reimagined implementation. Healthcare executives and portfolio managers will benefit from these insights and help to increase the enterprise adoption of this inevitable technology of the future.

Plan Language Summary

This article presents a practitioner's view of operating in emerging technology, exploring and advancing blockchain-based transformation in healthcare. Blockchain technology is maturing quickly, with financial technology (aka fintech) leading the way with efficient options for moving money, particularly in the public permissionless blockchain segment. The underlying technology allows for a broader set of capabilities, including provenance, data sharing, immutability, non-repudiation, and auditability, which provides for complete rethinking of existing business processes. These features can help to reimagine a more comprehensive set of use cases in many disciplines, including healthcare. However, enterprise adoption needs to catch up.

Unraveling a blockchain-based framework towards patient empowerment: A scoping review envisioning future smart health technologies

The COVID-19 pandemic shows us how crucial patient empowerment can be in the healthcare ecosystem. Now, we know that scientific advancement, technology integration, and patient empowerment need to be orchestrated to realize future smart health technologies. In that effort, this paper unravels the Good (advantages), Bad (challenges/limitations), and Ugly (lacking patient empowerment) of the blockchain technology integration in the Electronic Health Record (EHR) paradigm in the existing healthcare landscape. Our study addresses four methodically-tailored and patient-centric Research Questions, primarily examining 138 relevant scientific papers. This scoping review also explores how the pervasiveness of blockchain technology can help to empower patients in terms of access, awareness, and control. Finally, this scoping review leverages the insights gleaned from this study and contributes to the body of knowledge by proposing a patient-centric blockchain-based framework. This work will envision orchestrating three essential elements with harmony: scientific advancement (Healthcare and EHR), technology integration (Blockchain Technology), and patient empowerment (access, awareness, and control).

Blockchain in Healthcare: 2023 Predictions From Around the Globe

Over the past 50 years, although categorized as the "Information Age" or "Digital Age," the vast amounts of digitized data have been sorely underutilized. Only recently, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, efforts have accelerated to harness these data using blockchain technology as it pertains to healthcare. Today, through the blockchain infrastructure and its tokenization applications, we are able to leverage healthcare data effectively into more efficient business processes. In addition, we can secure better patient engagement and outcomes, while generating new revenue streams for an array of healthcare stakeholders. It is in the application of blockchain technology to compile these stockpiled data into new, compliant business models that we can reap the full potential of the blockchain. Here are predictions by members of the BHTY editorial board members on how we might further advance the role of blockchain in healthcare in 2023.