Is Blockchain a brand new method to authenticate?

For health care providers, obtaining credentialing is a very important step in establishing clinical practice and is critical to securing reimbursement from insurance firms and other third-party payers. Professional accreditation is complicated, expensive and tedious. Blockchain attestation is a brand new technology-based approach that may save time and reduce costs. What exactly is blockchain authentication? Let’s first take a look at the present authentication method, after which I’ll describe how blockchain technology can improve this process.

Current approach to skilled accreditation

Healthcare institutions have a responsibility to maintain patients secure while ensuring high standards of care. To achieve this, facilities must confirm the competence of their staff. Credentialing is the means of ensuring healthcare providers are qualified, trained, licensed, and capable of provide direct patient care (Patel and Sharma, 2019). Documentation verification may include state licensure, Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) license, board certification, education, continuing training, hospital affiliation, and malpractice insurance. This process requires contacting multiple organizations to authenticate information. All healthcare professionals regulated by a licensing authority to supply care without supervision or guidance from a person’s licensure have to be licensed (Patel and Sharma, 2019). Many doctors work in dozens of health care facilities and every of them requires references, which ends up in a big reduction in positions.
Because of them Credential Verification Organization (CVO) the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) will confirm references corresponding to diplomas and degrees against the unique source. The National Practitioner Data Bank (NPDB), a program of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, is a web based reporting repository of medical malpractice payment and hostile event information related to health care professionals, health care providers, and suppliers. The American Board of Medical Specialties (ABMS) certifies 150 medical specialties, while American Association of Nurse Practitioners (AANP) and American Nurse Certification Center (ANCC) will confirm nursing board certification.

Blockchain Attestation

Blockchain is a technology that stores data on hundreds of servers (quite than on a central server), in order that every network user can see entries in real time. This supports the creation of communication networks that would facilitate the exchange of healthcare data. Mearian (2019) describes blockchain as “a public electronic ledger… that can be openly shared among various users to create an immutable record of transactions,” each of which is timestamped and linked to a previous transaction. Each set of transactions becomes one other “block in the chain” linked to the subsequent block with a novel, secure code. Access will probably be granted to individual individuals, and once entered, data can’t be deleted. While not unattainable, blockchain is incredibly difficult to hack. To manipulate such a data system, you have to gain access to each computer on the network.

Several healthcare organizations are piloting blockchain authentication. The traditional method is pricey and time-consuming, often taking 4 to 6 months, and ends in lack of income and reimbursement. Using blockchain technology will enable organizations to efficiently access the most modern healthcare provider data. The Council for Affordable and Quality Health Care estimates that payers spend nearly $2 billion annually maintaining provider databases (American Hospital Association, 2019). This cost could be significantly reduced through the use of one secure, verified source corresponding to blockchain.

How would it not work?

Gaffney (2018), senior manager on the Health Research Institute of the consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), briefly describes how blockchain can speed up the authentication process: :

• The healthcare provider/skilled uploads basic information corresponding to educational history, certifications, licenses, malpractice insurance, and other documents to the blockchain.
• Primary sources access the blockchain and confirm vendor information.
• Healthcare facilities validate supplier data on the blockchain using primary source verification and either accept or reject the supplier after which submit the choice/result to the blockchain.

• If the provider is approved, the enrollment application will probably be sent to payers.
• Payers confirm the info on the blockchain using primary source verification and either accept or reject the appliance, then submit the result to the blockchain.
• The patient can confirm the provider’s credentials and whether or not they are online using the blockchain.
• Government regulators audit supplier authentication processes.

Could blockchain technology be the latest path to authentication? Theoretically, this may very well be the case, nonetheless, this progressive approach requires large-scale implementation, rigorous testing, retesting, and evaluation before it will possibly be fully adopted within the healthcare industry. It will probably be interesting to see how this develops.
Do you’ve any experience with blockchain technology? Please share within the comments below!

American Hospital Association. (2020). Blockchain pilot goals to enhance physician authentication. Downloaded from https://www.aha.org/aha-center-health-innovation-market-scan/2018-11-19-blockchain-pilot-aims-streamline-physician

Council for Affordable and Quality Health Care. Problem Description: Administrative Provider Data. Downloaded from https://www.caqh.org/sites/default/files/solutions/events/2011/q4/IssueBrief.pdf

Gaffney, A. (2018). Here’s how blockchain can speed up authentication. Health Research Institute, PwC USA. Downloaded from https://www.pwc.com/us/en/industries/health-industries/library/blockchain-could-accelerate-credentialing.html

Meanian, L. (2019). What is blockchain? The complete guide. Computer world. Downloaded from https://www.computerworld.com/article/3191077/what-is-blockchain-the-complete-guide.html

Patel, R. and Sharma, S. (2019). Authentication. StatPearls. Downloaded from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK519504/