| | February 20178UTLOOK Healthcare Tech Imagine for a moment a healthcare system where patientscontrol who sees their data. An individual at home recovering from a procedure might sign in to her medical account through a personalized dashboard on her phone, and with a couple of swipes give her physician consent to share her health record with her pharmacist. Or that same patient--determined to get a second opinion after a follow-up visit for imaging and labs--again might give permission to an off-site provider to go into her account and take a look at her results.In this imaginary world, there would be no need to travel from hospital A to hospital B for another appointment and another round of testing; and that pharmacist, wherever he might be, wouldn't need to be part of the same integrated network as his patient's referring physician. Medical information would live in "digital medical wallets"--and these wallets would be carried by the patients themselves.If it all sounds a little farfetched, that's because it is, at least for right now. But a few years down the road? Blockchain technology holds the promise to make it a reality.Blockchain BasicsBlockchainis the cryptographic technology developed for Bitcoin to allow secure transactions without a central clearinghouse. With blockchain, buyers and sellers connect directly, and their exchanges are recorded in blocks of data on a digital "distributed ledger" visible to everyone in the network. Transactions go through when blocks are linked together using cryptographic validation.In Bitcoin's case, the blockchain is public (transactions are anonymous), so anyone can participate and add to the ledger. That's not quite the way blockchain will work in healthcare.For healthcare applications, it is anticipated each person's "wallet" would employ a blockchain where information would only be visible to those who had permission from that individual. Each person grants access to participants in theirnetwork ­ such as primary care physicians, specialists, and family members. Network By ShahramEbadollahi, PhD, MBA VP, Innovation & Chief Science Officer, IBM Watson HealthBlockchain: A Way to (Safely) Bring Down the Barriers to DataShahramEbadollahiOpinionIn my
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