Current Healthcare System

Frost & Sullivan June 2017 Report: “Blockchain — Ecosystem Participants For Healthcare Industry,” shows that critical patient data, as well as information on most healthcare system, remains scattered over different systems and departments; As a result of the inefficiency of the current systems, crucial data is neither accessible nor available in times of need. To make matters worse, the current system is incomplete, and most players lack the full integration of this system, making the process of personal data management difficult. Also, the system is not interconnected which makes it impossible to share or exchange information securely within a healthcare department.

Statistics taken to evaluate the current healthcare system show that delivering high-quality healthcare services has been made difficult due to the misuse of information. The current statistics indicate that almost half of the clinical trials go unreported in most of US hospitals. Surprisingly it was discovered that 40% of healthcare provider data records are faulty with misleading information. The average cost of record keeping is way too expensive for our current economy to bear as it reaches $380 per record per year.

The systems used in keeping healthcare records are outdated as far as modern technology is concerned. Such systems puts the patient data at risk of being lost or mixed up, causing all sorts of confusion. As a result of the outdated technology, doctors find it difficult to fully take in charge patients since the process is time-consuming when it comes to sorting out records. Due to this, the cost of treatment or running a patient-oriented business has significantly increased.

Hindrances afflicting the current healthcare systems are unlimited and they keep on worsening with time. The need for an improved and affordable system is highly needed. Therefore the application of blockchain technology in data recording for the healthcare system would save both the government large expenses and the patient loss of data. The technology will ease the process of Health Information Exchange thereby able to curb instances of identity theft, spamming or financial data crimes.