Objective: To develop a research and development program to study factors that will support research, education and innovation using blockchain technology for health in an effective and sustainable manner. We proposed to conduct qualitative research to generate insights for developing a market strategy to build a research lab for the promotion of blockchain technologies in health in academic environments. The team aimed to identify the key barriers and opportunities for developing a sustainable research lab that generates research, education, and application of blockchain in healthcare at an academic medical institution and test those strategies in a real-world scenario. Methods: The research team identified potential customers and stakeholders through interviews and snowball sampling. The team conducted semi-structured interviews with 4 faculty researchers, 10 industry leaders, and 6 students from a variety of disciplines and organizations. The findings of these research activities informed our understanding of the needs of stratified customers and helped identify key assets and activities the lab will have to offer to meet those needs. Results: The research insights from data analysis were used to build the business model for establishing a blockchain in health impact lab. This systematic study of areas where blockchain technology can impact health will guide the future development of research agenda for the researchers on campus. Conclusion: Based on our learnings, we hope to design a Blockchain in Health Impact Lab to serve as a platform for students and faculty to come together with industry partners and explore current challenges of blockchain in healthcare. The academic medical center’s partnership with other healthcare providers will help create real-world opportunities to demonstrate and implement new technologies.
Justinia T. Blockchain Technologies: Opportunities for Solving Real-World Problems in Healthcare and Biomedical Sciences. Acta Informatica Medica. 2019;27(4):284.
2.
Raghavendra M. Can Blockchain technologies help tackle the opioid epidemic: A Narrative Review. Pain Medicine. 2019;20(10):1884–9.
3.
Esmaeilzadeh P, Mirzaei T. The Potential of Blockchain Technology for Health Information Exchange: Experimental Study From Patients’ Perspectives. Journal of Medical Internet Research. 2019;21(6):e14184.
4.
Gordon WJ, Catalini C. Blockchain Technology for Healthcare: Facilitating the Transition to Patient-Driven Interoperability. Computational and Structural Biotechnology Journal. 2018;16:224–30.
5.
Mettler M. Blockchain technology in healthcare: The revolution starts here. 2016 IEEE 18th International Conference on e-Health Networking, Applications and Services (Healthcom). IEEE; 2016. p. 1–3.
6.
Ivan D. Moving toward a blockchain-based method for the secure storage of patient records. :1–11.
7.
Ichikawa D, Kashiyama M, Ueno T. Tamper-Resistant Mobile Health Using Blockchain Technology. JMIR mHealth and uHealth. 2017;5(7):e111.
8.
Kuo TT, Ohno-Machado L. Modelchain: decentralized privacy-preserving healthcare predictive modeling framework on private blockchain networks. 2018;
9.
Bouras MA, Lu Q, Zhang F, Wan Y, Zhang T, Ning H. Distributed Ledger Technology for eHealth Identity Privacy: State of The Art and Future Perspective. Sensors. 2020;20(2):483.
10.
Zhang A, Lin X. Towards Secure and Privacy-Preserving Data Sharing in e-Health Systems via Consortium Blockchain. Journal of Medical Systems. 2018;42(8).
11.
Tian H, He J, Ding Y. Medical Data Management on Blockchain with Privacy. Journal of Medical Systems. 2019;43(2).
12.
Omar AA, Bhuiyan MZA, Basu A, Kiyomoto S, Rahman MS. Privacy-friendly platform for healthcare data in cloud based on blockchain environment. Future Generation Computer Systems. 2019;95:511–21.
13.
Garg C, Bansal A, Padappayil RP. COVID-19: Prolonged Social Distancing Implementation Strategy Using Blockchain-Based Movement Passes. Journal of Medical Systems. 2020;44(9).
14.
Bansal A, Garg C, Padappayil RP. Optimizing the Implementation of COVID-19 “Immunity Certificates” Using Blockchain. Journal of Medical Systems. 2020;44(9).
15.
Khurshid A. Applying Blockchain Technology to Address the Crisis of Trust During the COVID-19 Pandemic. JMIR Medical Informatics. 2020;8(9):e20477.
16.
Blockchain A, Hub. Austin blockchain hub. 2020;
17.
Dive H. Healthcare dive. 2020;
18.
Blockchain A, Collective. 2020;
19.
Osterwalder A, Pigneur Y. Business model generation: a handbook for visionaries, game changers, and challengers. 2010;
20.
Lee K, Lim K, Jung SY, Ji H, Hong K, Hwang H, et al. Perspectives of Patients, Health Care Professionals, and Developers Toward Blockchain-Based Health Information Exchange: Qualitative Study. Journal of Medical Internet Research. 2020;22(11):e18582.
21.
Moniruzzaman M, Chowdhury F, Ferdous M. Examining usability issues in blockchain-based cryptocurrency wallets.
22.
Springer. :631–43.
23.
Lo S, Xu X, Chiam Y, Lu Q. Evaluating suitability of applying blockchain. 2017;158–61.
24.
de la Torre-Díez I, González S, López-Coronado M. EHR Systems in the Spanish Public Health National System: The Lack of Interoperability between Primary and Specialty Care. Journal of Medical Systems. 2013;37(1).
25.
Wright SA. Technical and Legal Challenges for Healthcare Blockchains and Smart Contracts. 2019 ITU Kaleidoscope: ICT for Health: Networks, Standards and Innovation (ITU K). IEEE; 2019. p. 1–9.
26.
Hackius N, Petersen M. Blockchain in logistics and supply chain: trick or treat? :3–18.
27.
Cole R, Stevenson M, Aitken J. Blockchain technology: implications for operations and supply chain management. Supply Chain Management: An International Journal. 2019;24(4):469–83.
28.
Queiroz MM, Telles R, Bonilla SH. Blockchain and supply chain management integration: a systematic review of the literature. Supply Chain Management: An International Journal. 2019;25(2):241–54.
29.
Korpela K, Hallikas J, Dahlberg T. Digital supply chain transformation toward blockchain integration. 2017;
30.
Apte S, Petrovsky N. Will blockchain technology revolutionize excipient supply chain management? J Excipients Food Chemicals. 2016;(3):910.
31.
Johnson A. Skillcoin: how blockchain-based credentialing will help curb discriminatory hiring practices. USFL Rev. 2019;439.
32.
Jirgensons M, Kapenieks J. Blockchain and the Future of Digital Learning Credential Assessment and Management. Journal of Teacher Education for Sustainability. 2018;20(1):145–56.
33.
Khurshid A, Gadnis A. Using Blockchain to Create Transaction Identity for Persons Experiencing Homelessness in America: Policy Proposal. JMIR Research Protocols. 2019;8(3):e10654.
34.
Azaria A, Ekblaw A, Vieira T, Lippman A. Medrec: using blockchain for medical data access and permission management. :25–30.
35.
Brodersen C, Kalis B, Leong C, Mitchell E, Pupo E, Truscott A. Blockchain: securing a new health interoperability experience. Accenture LLP. :1–11.
36.
Avital M. Peer Review: Toward a Blockchain-enabled Market-based Ecosystem. Communications of the Association for Information Systems. 2018;42:646–53.
37.
Gipp B, Breitinger C, Meuschke N, Beel J. CryptSubmit: introducing securely timestamped manuscript submission and peer review feedback using the blockchain. 2017;1–4.
38.
Usman M, Kallhoff V, Khurshid A. The Case for Establishing a Blockchain Research and Development Program at an Academic Medical Center. Blockchain in Healthcare Today. 2021;
39.
Raikwar M, Mazumdar S, Ruj S, Gupta S, Chattopadhyay S, Lam A, et al. A blockchain framework for insurance processes. :1–4.
40.
Linne A. Payroll based blockchain identity. 2018;
41.
He M, Han X, Jiang F, Zhang R, Liu X, Liu X. BlockMeds: a blockchain-based online prescription system with privacy protection BT -Service-oriented computing -ICSOC 2019 Workshops. 2020;299–303.
42.
Zhuang Y, Sheets L, Shae Z, Tsai J, Shyu CR. Applying blockchain technology for health information exchange and persistent monitoring for clinical trials. American Medical Informatics Association. 2018;1167.
43.
Liang X, Zhao J, Shetty S, Liu J, Li D. Integrating blockchain for data sharing and collaboration in mobile healthcare applications. 2017;1–5.
44.
Meingast M, Roosta T, Sastry S. Security and privacy issues with health care information technology. 2006;5453–8.
45.
Agbo C, Mahmoud Q, Eklund J. Blockchain technology in healthcare: a systematic review. 2019;56.
Citation
Copyright
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
The statements, opinions and data contained in the journal are solely those of the individual authors and contributors and not of the publisher and the editor(s). We stay neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
,
