https://escholarship.org/content/qt3fb8208d/qt3fb8208d.pdf?t=qamhzk

Blockchain distributed ledger technologies for biomedical and health care applications

Blockchain technology has gained substantial attention in recent years with increased interest in several diverse fields, including the healthcare industry. Blockchain offers a secure, distributed database that can operate without a central authority or administrator. Blockchain uses a distributed, peer-to-peer network to make a continuous, growing list of ordered records called blocks to form a digital ledger. Each transaction, represented in a cryptographically signed block, is then automatically validated by the network itself. Blockchain has also garnered interest as a platform to improve the authenticity and transparency of healthcare data through many use cases, from maintaining permissions in electronic health records (EHR) to streamlining claims processing. In this article, we describe the basics of blockchain and illustrate current and future applications of this technology within the healthcare industry.

Bitcoin, a cryptocurrency and payment system first introduced in 2008, is one of the most well-known implementations of blockchain.1 The transfer of digital assets, such as bitcoin, within a blockchain is initiated when a seller or payer submits a transaction (Figure [A]).2 These transactions are broadcasted to every peer connected to the blockchain network where clients, called miners, use a cryptographic algorithm to validate the transaction. This validation solves 2 key problems that previously existed with digital currency exchange: ensuring that the digital asset exists and that it has not already been spent. A transaction is said to be valid if a miner deems it is well formed (the input and output contain only the fields that are defined in the protocol), and the outputs it attempts to transfer exist. Miners are not certified and can be anyone who volunteers to invest their resources. The incentive for miners comes in the form of the bitcoin, which are generated and rewarded to the miners for every block of transactions validated. …

Blockchain Technology: Applications in Health Care.

Blockchain is a technology making the shared registry concept from distributed systems a reality for a number of application domains, from the cryptocurrency one to potentially any industrial system requiring decentralized, robust, trusted, and automated decision making in a multi-stakeholder situation. Nevertheless, the actual advantages in using blockchain instead of any other traditional solution (such as centralized databases) are not completely understood to date, or at least there is a strong need for a vademecum guiding designers toward the right decision about when to adopt blockchain or not, which kind of blockchain better meets use-case requirements, and how to use it. In this paper, we aim at providing the community with such a vademecum, while giving a general presentation of blockchain that goes beyond its usage in Bitcoin and surveying a selection of the vast literature that emerged in the last few years. We draw the key requirements and their evolution when passing from permissionless to permissioned blockchains, presenting the differences between proposed and experimented consensus mechanisms, and describing existing blockchain platforms.

/pdf/a-vademecum-on-blockchain-technologies-when-which-and-how-44ddp151gk.pdf

A Vademecum on Blockchain Technologies: When, Which, and How

Logic on a first remote device receives a first transaction number and personal data transmitted from a second remote device. The first transaction number was received from a distributed public database in response to a transmission, from the second remote device, of a signed hash value and a first public key associated with a first private key on the second remote device. The signed hash value was created by signing a hash value with the first private key and the hash value was generated by hashing the personal data with a hashing algorithm on the second remote device. The logic uses the first transaction number to retrieve the signed hash value and the first public key from the distributed public database. The logic hashes the personal data using the hashing algorithm to create a generated hash value and verifies the signed hash value against the generated hash value.

Identity management service using a blockchain providing certifying transactions between devices

This research is supported by the Employment Based Postgraduate Program of the Irish Research
Council (IRC) Project ID: EBPPG/2015/185 and partially funded under the SFI Strategic Partnership Program by
Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) and FotoNation Ltd. (Xperi Corporation) Project ID: 13/SPP/I2868 on Next
Generation Imaging for Smartphone and Embedded Platforms.

/pdf/a-blockchain-based-smart-contract-system-for-healthcare-v2ngea4o27.pdf

A Blockchain-Based Smart Contract System for Healthcare Management

Healthcare transaction validation systems and methods are presented. Healthcare transactions associated with a stakeholder are compiled into a chain of healthcare transaction blocks. The chain can be considered a chronicle of person's healthcare path through life. When a transaction is conducted, the corresponding healthcare parameters (e.g., inputs, outputs, clinical evidence, outcomes, etc.) are sent to one or more validation devices. The devices establish a validity of the transaction and generate a new block via a proof-of-work principle. Once the new block has been calculated it can be appended to the stakeholder's health care blockchain.

Nicholas J. Witchey

Papers

Healthcare transaction validation via blockchain proof-of work, systems and methods

Healthcare transaction validation via blockchain, systems and methods