The communication of healthcare records is neither secure nor efficient enough to serve its purpose, with frequent breaches data threatening the sanctity of the entire system.
Context & Challenges
Data breaches cost the healthcare industry an average of $6.5M, over 60% more than other industries. More than 11 billion records have been leaked in data breaches over the past 3 years, and one in four individuals have had their healthcare data breached.
In addition to poor security, interoperability is a significant challenge for Electronic Health Records (EHRs). Due to the sensitive nature of health records, sharing them between health professionals can often entail repeated bundles of paperwork, redundant testing, and poor communication and coordination which can in turn lead to detrimental errors. In fact, 50-70% of doctors experience burnout symptoms related to cumbersome EHR workflows.
In the time of COVID-19, interoperability is of unprecedented importance, as institutions must quickly transfer records and immediately gain access to patients’ records. To use EHR in alternate locations such as tent hospitals, one needs to build the department units in the software, extend Wi-Fi, deploy hardware, printers, and test everything. In its current state, scheduling a CT scan through EHR systems can take up to 45 minutes, which does not lend itself to emergency healthcare.
Not only are traditional healthcare records not nearly secure enough, the procedures for addressing breaches are inefficient and often extend the damage, pointing to gross miscommunication and lack of oversight in the space.
It took the healthcare industry an average of 236 days to identify a breach and 83 days to contain it, meaning that in the case of a breach, patients’ records could be vulnerable for almost a year. Half of individuals who had their data breached discovered it themselves, while only one-third were told about the breach by the institution in question.
This represents a breadth of costs and losses: emotional costs for patients, brand loyalty losses, falls in consumer trust, financial losses for the industry, time costs, and labor costs.
— Patients
Healthcare data breaches result in an average of $2500 out-of-pocket costs for patients, not to mention emotional and time costs.
— Healthcare Providers
Healthcare providers must endure laborious processes to identify, limit, and address the damages of breaches. They also suffer significant reputation costs and customer losses, with 25% of those who suffered breaches switching healthcare providers.
— Healthcare Insurance
Healthcare insurance companies handle a huge amount of healthcare records and suffer similarly to providers in the event of a breach. Additionally, 21% of individuals who suffer a breach change insurance providers.
— The Government
Government institutions like the FBI are responsible for identifying and treating breaches, processes which are burdensome in today’s environment.
Encrypted health records on STRATO Mercata provides enhanced protection & streamlines data sharing with relevant parties.
Solution Benefits
The challenge for the health industry is finding a way to protect patients’ privacy while still seamlessly and quickly sharing records between parties. STRATO Mercata provides a solution to both of these challenges simultaneously.
On the one hand, STRATO Mercata’s single, consolidated ledger allows parties to access the same data in real-time without labor or time-intensive exchanges.
On the other, STRATO Mercata maintains patient privacy through its cryptographic public and private keys.
Not only does it streamline industry operations around healthcare records, STRATO Mercata also gives patients more access and control of their own data, as they can view their life-long health history privately and choose to share certain aspects of their data with relevant parties.
Specific benefits include:
— Store all healthcare data in one, consolidated, secure ledger
— Spin private chains to immediately and securely provide access to data to new permissioned parties
— Automatically generate a traceable and immutable record of all access in real-time
— Seamlessly scale to include an infinite number of parties and integrate with pre-existing systems, driving interoperability
Additional features include:
— RESTful APIs for direct connection of IoT devices such as provider’s iPads to the blockchain network
— Identity Management, OAuth, and SSO capabilities for simplified IoT authorization and user login
— Privacy via private chains to keep sensitive data private
— Enterprise Data Modeling for integration of existing and future EHR models
