Health data and data privacy — a perfect match for MADANA
Just like our daily life the health industry is also becoming more and more digitalized. Naturally this industry profits from transparent and secure practices immensely. Our partner CryptoTec, for instance, is working with the pharmaceutical giant Merck to combatant sales of fraudulent medicine through a Blockchain based tracking system. This extremely important use case is only the beginning of Blockchain’s impact in the health sector.
The way health data is collected, shared and analyzed has changed considerably. Digital patient files are becoming increasingly complex. Valuable data is recorded at any time. Hospitals know the time a patient was infected, the exact doses of medicine he received, and how he was treated. This data holds great promise for research. The effectiveness of medicine and procedures could be studied much quicker with reliable access to health data. But for researchers the access to these important records are slow, expensive or not possible at all. The reason is obvious. Health data is not only extremely valuable, but also very sensitive information. No third party should know our personal medical history. Insurance companies might drop patients, social stigma might be associated with certain illnesses. The data can be so detailed that anonymized data points even could reveal private information.
But how can this problem be solved? How can researchers all over the world get access to this information?
MADANA can provide insights without handing over data
Wherever the data is stored, analysis plug-ins can connect to the MADANA system to offer that information for data analysis. In this case, data is all over the place: Patient files at a hospital, personal behavior, and dietary information taken directly from various smartphone applications. This data stays encrypted in the hands of the various parties. Researchers then all over the world can use data analysis schemes that utilize this information just as it is generated. At this point, the MADANA approach differs from current data markets. In the MADANA ecosystem, the analysis is run in a such a way that neither the analysis plug-in provider, the data analysis buyer and not even MADANA itself can read any single data point. Only after the analysis is finished the results are sold to the data analysis buyer. And this is exactly what is needed. Researchers don’t care about single patients behavior. Insights are generated when many data points are processed together.
The possibilities are endless. An open data market that can process private information without compromising individual privacy has unforeseen potential. Questions that could be asked might be: “What is the impact of various doses of alcohol on medicament efficiency across different weight groups?” Access to studies with enough participants would be too expensive for the average researcher. But since the costs of organizing data, data reliability and privacy concerns are brought down through our approach this data is available to anyone.
The Healthcare Internet of Things
This new way of access will become even more valuable in the upcoming years. A rapidly increasing number of smart sensors in the health sector not only will provide data but will also be able to subsidize their own manufacturing costs. Expensive intelligent glucose or blood pressure devices could generate data, sell it through the truly anonymous MADANA system and earn PAX tokens. This will make important health devices more accessible to patients that would not be able to afford them otherwise.
Society will profit immensely. Research for new medicaments will be faster. Groups that currently are too small to be considered in studies will be represented in the research. Predictive modeling can be used for early diagnosis.
As data privacy — especially in the health sector — is a highly complex field, MADANA is partnering up with different parties to realize data privacy in an efficient way. Our close connection to universities ensures the development of state-of-the-art methods and tools. Through our partnership with CryptoTec, we will be able to set foot in the current health industry.
But most importantly, MADANA is working closely with the European Union and hope to enable and secure the legal framework for the right handling of data in the health sector. Health institutions, hospitals, and doctors are not able to jump on the next technology by themself. Neither do they have the rights to hand over information for the greater good. Our aim is to work with governments together to ensure the right legislation that allows the usage of our technology and also to encourage government support and fundings for all parties in the health sector.
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