Blockchain Papers

R. Sreejith, S. Senthil

The exponential growth in the global population and significant advancements in healthcare broadened the scope of intervention for e-Healthcare through decentralized data access and information exchange, making complex clinical decisions. e-Healthcare can perform several functionalities, including EHR communication, telemedicine, and complex clinical decision systems (CCDS), but large-scale users still find it challenging to maintain interoperability, stability, and scalability. Accommodating an extensive array of stakeholders, which includes patients, doctors, hospitals, and laboratories, demands interoperability to serve scalable services. FHIR frameworks have played a vital role in e-Healthcare designs. Most of the existing HL7-FHIR frameworks have used REST-API using HTTP-query for CRUD tasks that impose numerous rules and constraints, making the process more complex and time-consuming, violating the quality-of-service (QoS) standards on different levels. This paper develops a novel, robust Smart-Contract Authentication Assisted HL7-FHIR framework toward an interoperable e-Healthcare solution. Unlike classical REST API-based FHIR, our proposed method applies a Graph-mapping concept that transforms each resource variable into an equivalent Graph-Mapped Data Structure (GMS), which is subsequently stored in the NoSQL MongoDB database, reducing computational costs and time to meet QoS demands. The proposed model employs three key components, GMS-driven HL7 FHIR Gateway Model, Smart Contract Authentication and Client Model. The Smart Contract function helped verify and authenticate users to ensure privacy and secure EHR exchange. The assessment of the performance of the proposed model reveals a significant reduction in computational time with optimal resource utilization making it a significant and viable option to better the real-world e-Healthcare mechanisms.

Yinqiu Liu, Hongyang Du, Dusit Niyato, Jiawen Kang · 8 authors

The rapid development of Artificial Intelligence-Generated Content (AIGC) has brought daunting challenges regarding service latency, security, and trustworthiness. Recently, researchers presented the edge AIGC paradigm, effectively optimize the service latency by distributing AIGC services to edge devices. However, AIGC products are still unprotected and vulnerable to tampering and plagiarization. Moreover, as a kind of online non-fungible digital property, the free circulation of AIGC products is hindered by the lack of trustworthiness in open networks. In this article, for the first time, we present a blockchain-empowered framework to manage the lifecycle of edge AIGC products. Specifically, leveraging fraud proof, we first propose a protocol to protect the ownership and copyright of AIGC, called Proof-of-AIGC. Then, we design an incentive mechanism to guarantee the legitimate and timely executions of the funds-AIGC ownership exchanges among anonymous users. Furthermore, we build a multi-weight subjective logic-based reputation scheme, with which AIGC producers can determine which edge service provider is trustworthy and reliable to handle their services. Through numerical results, the superiority of the proposed approach is demonstrated. Last but not least, we discuss important open directions for further research.

Hassaan Malik, Tayyaba Anees, Ahmad Naeem, Rizwan Ali Naqvi · 5 authors

Due to the rapid rate of SARS-CoV-2 dissemination, a conversant and effective strategy must be employed to isolate COVID-19. When it comes to determining the identity of COVID-19, one of the most significant obstacles that researchers must overcome is the rapid propagation of the virus, in addition to the dearth of trustworthy testing models. This problem continues to be the most difficult one for clinicians to deal with. The use of AI in image processing has made the formerly insurmountable challenge of finding COVID-19 situations more manageable. In the real world, there is a problem that has to be handled about the difficulties of sharing data between hospitals while still honoring the privacy concerns of the organizations. When training a global deep learning (DL) model, it is crucial to handle fundamental concerns such as user privacy and collaborative model development. For this study, a novel framework is designed that compiles information from five different databases (several hospitals) and edifies a global model using blockchain-based federated learning (FL). The data is validated through the use of blockchain technology (BCT), and FL trains the model on a global scale while maintaining the secrecy of the organizations. The proposed framework is divided into three parts. First, we provide a method of data normalization that can handle the diversity of data collected from five different sources using several computed tomography (CT) scanners. Second, to categorize COVID-19 patients, we ensemble the capsule network (CapsNet) with incremental extreme learning machines (IELMs). Thirdly, we provide a strategy for interactively training a global model using BCT and FL while maintaining anonymity. Extensive tests employing chest CT scans and a comparison of the classification performance of the proposed model to that of five DL algorithms for predicting COVID-19, while protecting the privacy of the data for a variety of users, were undertaken. Our findings indicate improved effectiveness in identifying COVID-19 patients and achieved an accuracy of 98.99%. Thus, our model provides substantial aid to medical practitioners in their diagnosis of COVID-19.

Posham Uppamma, Sweta Bhattacharya

Blockchain technology has gained immense momentum in the present era of information and digitalization and is likely to gain extreme popularity among the next generation, with diversified applications that spread far beyond cryptocurrencies and bitcoin. The application of blockchain technology is prominently observed in various spheres of social life, such as government administration, industries, healthcare, finance, and various other domains. In healthcare, the role of blockchain technology can be visualized in data-sharing, allowing users to choose specific data and control data access based on user type, which are extremely important for the maintenance of Electronic Health Records (EHRs). Machine learning and blockchain are two distinct technical fields: machine learning deals with data analysis and prediction, whereas blockchain emphasizes maintaining data security. The amalgamation of these two concepts can achieve prediction results from authentic datasets without compromising integrity. Such predictions have the additional advantage of enhanced trust in comparison to the application of machine learning algorithms alone. In this paper, we focused on data pertinent to diabetic retinopathy disease and its prediction. Diabetic retinopathy is a chronic disease caused by diabetes and leads to complete blindness. The disease requires early diagnosis to reduce the chances of vision loss. The dataset used is a publicly available dataset collected from the IEEE data port. The data were pre-processed using the median filtering technique and lesion segmentation was performed on the image data. These data were further subjected to the Taylor African Vulture Optimization (AVO) algorithm for hyper-parameter tuning, and then the most significant features were fed into the SqueezeNet classifier, which predicted the occurrence of diabetic retinopathy (DR) disease. The final output was saved in the blockchain architecture, which was accessed by the EHR manager, ensuring authorized access to the prediction results and related patient information. The results of the classifier were compared with those of earlier research, which demonstrated that the proposed model is superior to other models when measured by the following metrics: accuracy (94.2%), sensitivity (94.8%), and specificity (93.4%).

Zhen Ling Teo, Daniel Shu Wei Ting

No abstract is available for this record.

Ray Dogum, Daniel Uribe

The global non-fungible token (NFT) market size is expected to grow by USD 147.24 billion from 2021 to 2026 at a CAGR of 35.27% and According to Precedence Research, the global metaverse market size is projected to be worth around USD 1.6. Trillion by 2030 and expanding growth at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 50.74% from 2022 to 2030. What does this mean for healthcare and where’s the big opportunity? Although we are in the nascent stage for both NFTs and the Metaverse in healthcare, many will agree that some of the biggest transformations in healthcare will be driven by NFTs, specifically as ownership of data and our health records become the increasing focus in healthcare. Metaverse applications in healthcare also provide an enormous opportunity with many seeing this as the next generation of remote patient care and a new medium for patient engagement. Accenture has called the Metaverse the “next horizon in healthcare”. Immersive metaverse experiences can go beyond patient care and can transform training for doctors, surgeons, and healthcare professionals. Join Daniel Uribe of GenoBank.io to explore the varied and exciting applications ahead with NFTs and Metaverse including decentralized science (DeSci), decentralized health research, BioNFTs and the future of genome ownership.

Aya Hamid Ameen, Mazin Abed Mohammed, Ahmed Noori Rashid

Abstract The Internet of medical things (IoMT) is a modern technology that is increasingly being used to provide good healthcare services. As IoMT devices are vulnerable to cyberattacks, healthcare centers and patients face privacy and security challenges. A safe IoMT environment has been used by combining blockchain (BC) technology with artificial intelligence (AI). However, the services of the systems are costly and suffer from security and privacy problems. This study aims to summarize previous research in the IoMT and discusses the roles of AI, BC, and cybersecurity in the IoMT, as well as the problems, opportunities, and directions of research in this field based on a comprehensive literature review. This review describes the integration schemes of AI, BC, and cybersecurity technologies, which can support the development of new systems based on a decentralized approach, especially in healthcare applications. This study also identifies the strengths and weaknesses of these technologies, as well as the datasets they use.

Kashfi Shormita Kushal, Tanvir Ahmed, Md. Ashraf Uddin, Muhammed Nasir Uddin

In recent years, COVID-19 has impacted millions of individuals worldwide, resulting in numerous fatalities across several countries. While RT-PCR technology remains the most reliable method for detecting COVID-19, it is both expensive and time-consuming. As a result, researchers have explored various machine learning and deep learning-based approaches to rapidly identify COVID-19 cases using X-ray images, with reduced costs and shorter processing times. However, preserving patient confidentiality poses challenges within third-party-controlled systems, potentially failing to safeguard patients from potential disgrace and discomfort. Nonetheless, blockchain technology offers the potential to securely store sensitive medical data anonymously, without requiring third-party intervention. Consequently, the combination of deep learning and blockchain could offer a viable solution to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 while ensuring patient privacy protection. In this paper, we propose a hybrid model of blockchain and deep learning model for automatically detecting COVID-19 using chest X-rays (CXR). The deep learning model includes a stacking ensemble of three modified pre-trained Deep Learning (DL) models: VGG16, Xception, and DenseNet169. The model obtained an accuracy of 99.10% and 98.60% for binary and multi-class respectively. Further, To ensure COVID-19 patients’ privacy and security, the Ethereum blockchain has been adopted to store information related to COVID-19 cases. In addition, a smart contract on the blockchain has been designed for handling X-ray images in the Interplanetary File System (IPFS).

Abdulaziz Aljaloud

In smart systems context, the storage and distribution of health-critical data – medical images, test reports, clinical information etc. that is processed and transmitted via web portal and pervasive devices which requires a secure and efficient management of patients’ medical records. The reliance on centralized data centers in the cloud to process, store, and transmit patients’ medical records poses some critical challenges including but not limited to operational costs, storage space requirements, and importantly threats and vulnerabilities to the security and privacy of health-critical data. To address these issues, this research proposes a framework and provides a proof-of-the-concept named Patient-Centric Medical Image Management System (PCMIMS). The proposed solution PCMIMS utilizes the Ethereum blockchain and Inter-Planetary File System (IPFS) to enable secure and decentralized storage capabilities that lack in existing solution for patients’ medical image management. The PCMIMS design facilitates secure access to Patient-Centric information for health units, patients, medics, and third-party requestors by incorporating the Patient-Centric access control protocol, ensuring privacy and control over medical data. The proposed framework is validated through the deployment of a prototype based on smart contract executed on Ethereum TESTNET blockchain that demonstrates efficiency and feasibility of the solution. Validation results highlight a correlation between (i) number of transactions (i.e., data storage and retrieval), (ii) gas consumption (i.e., energy efficiency), and (iii) data size (volume of Patient-Centric medical images) via repeated trials in Microsoft Windows environment. Validation results also indicate computational efficiency of the solution in terms of processing three most common types of Patient-Centric medical images namely (a) Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) (b) X-radiation (X-Rays), (c) Computed tomography (CT) scan. This research primarily contributes by designing, implementing, and validating a blockchain based practical solution for efficient and secure management of Patient-Centric medical image management in the context of smart healthcare systems.

Nouhaila El Akrami, Mohamed Hanine, Emmanuel Soriano Flores, Daniel Gavilanes Aray · 5 authors

Blockchain and machine learning (ML) has garnered growing interest as cutting-edge technologies that have witnessed tremendous strides in their respective domains. Blockchain technology provides a decentralized and immutable ledger, enabling secure and transparent transactions without intermediaries. Alternatively, ML is a sub-field of artificial intelligence (AI) that empowers systems to enhance their performance by learning from data. The integration of these data-driven paradigms holds the potential to reinforce data privacy and security, improve data analysis accuracy, and automate complex processes. The confluence of blockchain and ML has sparked increasing interest among scholars and researchers. Therefore, a bibliometric analysis is carried out to investigate the key focus areas, hotspots, potential prospects, and dynamical aspects of the field. This paper evaluates 700 manuscripts drawn from the Web of Science (WoS) core collection database, spanning from 2017 to 2022. The analysis is conducted using advanced bibliometric tools (e.g., Bibliometrix R, VOSviewer, and CiteSpace) to assess various aspects of the research area regarding publication productivity, influential articles, prolific authors, the productivity of academic countries and institutions, as well as the intellectual structure in terms of hot topics and emerging trends. The findings suggest that upcoming research should focus on blockchain technology, AI-powered 5G networks, industrial cyber-physical systems, IoT environments, and autonomous vehicles. This paper provides a valuable foundation for both academic scholars and practitioners as they contemplate future projects on the integration of blockchain and ML.

Muhammad Izhar, Syed Asad Ali Naqvi, Adeel Ahmed, Saima Abdullah · 6 authors

This paper presents an innovative framework that leverages cutting-edge technologies to revolutionize healthcare systems, focusing on data security, privacy, and efficient medical diagnosis. Our approach integrates distributed ledger technology (DLT), artificial intelligence (AI), and edge computing to create a robust and dependable medical ecosystem. In our proposed system, patients’ health data is securely managed using a combination of elliptic curve cryptography-based identity-based cryptosystems and edge nodes, ensuring both privacy and integrity. These edge nodes, designed for low-power and short-range communication, play a pivotal role in in-vivo data collection and monitoring within the human body. The DLT model at the core of our framework utilizes peer-to-peer networks, enabling seamless information exchange while eliminating the need for centralized servers. We emphasize public edge DLTs, such as Ethereum, to ensure accessibility and data ownership for all stakeholders. Furthermore, our system incorporates a hybrid machine learning model for early detection and prediction of security threats, enhancing overall system efficiency. Our findings demonstrate a remarkable 99.7% accuracy in classification using this approach. In conclusion, this framework’s multidisciplinary approach bridges the gap between healthcare, edge computing, and DLT, promising real-time data processing, enhanced security, and privacy preservation. With the rise of the Internet of Things, this innovation holds the potential to transform the future of healthcare technology.

Rima Kaafarani, Leila Ismail, Oussama Zahwe

Blockchain technology has piqued the interest of businesses of all types, while consistently improving and adapting to business requirements. Several blockchain platforms have emerged, making it challenging to select a suitable one for a specific type of business. This paper presents a classification of over one hundred blockchain platforms. We develop smart contracts for detecting healthcare insurance frauds using the top two blockchain platforms selected based on our proposed decision-making map approach which selects the top suitable platforms for healthcare insurance frauds detection application. Our classification shows that the largest percentage of platforms can be used for all types of application domains, the second biggest percentage for financial services, and a small number is to develop applications in specific domains. Our decision-making map and performance evaluations reveal that Hyperledger Fabric surpassed Neo in all metrics for detecting healthcare insurance frauds.

Lennart Ante, Ender Demir

ChatGPT is an artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot that provides users with detailed responses and accurate answers to any questions. It has garnered significant attention after its launch in November 2022. We analyze the returns of AI-themed crypto assets around the launch and widespread attention towards ChatGPT. We reveal significant abnormal returns for AI tokens after the launch of ChatGPT, up to 41% over the course of two weeks. Moreover, 90% of tokens exhibit positive abnormal returns. This suggests that the attention towards ChatGPT and AI in general has transitioned to cryptocurrency markets, resulting in positive price effects for AI-related cryptocurrencies.

Francisca Chibugo Udegbe, Ejike Innocent Nwankwo, Geneva Tamunobarafiri Igwama, Janet Aderonke Olaboye

The integration of blockchain technology in biomedical diagnostics offers a promising solution to the challenges of data security and privacy in infectious disease surveillance. As the digitalization of healthcare systems accelerates, the need to protect sensitive health information becomes increasingly critical. Blockchain, with its decentralized and immutable nature, provides a robust framework for ensuring the integrity and confidentiality of biomedical data. This abstract explores how blockchain technology can be leveraged to enhance data security and privacy in the context of infectious disease surveillance, where rapid and accurate data sharing is essential for effective public health responses. Infectious disease surveillance relies on the collection, analysis, and dissemination of large volumes of data, often shared across multiple institutions and geographical regions. Traditional systems for managing this data are vulnerable to breaches, unauthorized access, and data tampering, which can compromise public health efforts and patient privacy. Blockchain technology addresses these vulnerabilities by enabling secure, transparent, and tamper-proof data exchanges. Each transaction or data entry is recorded in a distributed ledger, accessible only to authorized participants, thus ensuring that the data remains secure and unaltered. Moreover, blockchain’s inherent transparency allows for real-time monitoring and auditing of data flows, which is crucial in the timely detection and response to infectious disease outbreaks. The use of smart contracts within blockchain networks further enhances the automation and efficiency of data management, ensuring that data is only accessed and shared according to predefined rules and conditions. This not only safeguards patient privacy but also builds trust among stakeholders, including patients, healthcare providers, and public health authorities. In conclusion, the integration of blockchain technology in biomedical diagnostics presents a transformative approach to addressing the critical issues of data security and privacy in infectious disease surveillance. By leveraging blockchain's unique features, healthcare systems can ensure that sensitive diagnostic data is protected, thus supporting more effective and secure public health interventions in the fight against infectious diseases. Keywords: One Health Approach, Zoonotic Disease, Early Detection, Development, Portable Diagnostic Device.

Francisca Chibugo Udegbe, Ejike Innocent Nwankwo, Geneva Tamunobarafiri Igwama, Janet Aderonke Olaboye

The integration of blockchain technology in biomedical diagnostics offers a promising solution to the challenges of data security and privacy in infectious disease surveillance. As the digitalization of healthcare systems accelerates, the need to protect sensitive health information becomes increasingly critical. Blockchain, with its decentralized and immutable nature, provides a robust framework for ensuring the integrity and confidentiality of biomedical data. This abstract explores how blockchain technology can be leveraged to enhance data security and privacy in the context of infectious disease surveillance, where rapid and accurate data sharing is essential for effective public health responses. Infectious disease surveillance relies on the collection, analysis, and dissemination of large volumes of data, often shared across multiple institutions and geographical regions. Traditional systems for managing this data are vulnerable to breaches, unauthorized access, and data tampering, which can compromise public health efforts and patient privacy. Blockchain technology addresses these vulnerabilities by enabling secure, transparent, and tamper-proof data exchanges. Each transaction or data entry is recorded in a distributed ledger, accessible only to authorized participants, thus ensuring that the data remains secure and unaltered. Moreover, blockchain’s inherent transparency allows for real-time monitoring and auditing of data flows, which is crucial in the timely detection and response to infectious disease outbreaks. The use of smart contracts within blockchain networks further enhances the automation and efficiency of data management, ensuring that data is only accessed and shared according to predefined rules and conditions. This not only safeguards patient privacy but also builds trust among stakeholders, including patients, healthcare providers, and public health authorities. In conclusion, the integration of blockchain technology in biomedical diagnostics presents a transformative approach to addressing the critical issues of data security and privacy in infectious disease surveillance. By leveraging blockchain's unique features, healthcare systems can ensure that sensitive diagnostic data is protected, thus supporting more effective and secure public health interventions in the fight against infectious diseases. Keywords: Blockchain, Biomedical Diagnostics, Data Security, Privacy, Infectious Disease Surveillance.

Wei Zhang

Blockchain technology can reduce the need for intermediaries in various types of transactions by providing a decentralized and secure ledger that can be accessed and updated by all parties involved in the transaction. Clinical trials are essential for bringing new drugs and therapies to market, but the current clinical research process is often marred by inefficiencies, data inaccuracies, and a lack of transparency. The implementation of blockchain technology in clinical trials has the potential to address these challenges by providing a secure and transparent platform for data management. By leveraging the power of blockchain, healthcare providers can improve the integrity and accuracy of clinical trial data, enhance trust in the clinical research process, and ultimately improve patient outcomes. In this article, we propose the use of blockchain technology in clinical trials and explore its potential benefits for the healthcare. The implementation of a blockchain-based data management system for clinical trials holds significant potential to address several challenges associated with the current clinical research process. By improving the integrity and security of medical data, enhancing trust, and easing regulatory burden, such a system can promote the efficient and effective conduct of clinical trials. The adoption of a blockchain-based solution for clinical trial data management has the potential to optimize costs, contributing to the sustainability of healthcare services. It also provides a model for future research and development of blockchain-based solutions in the field of clinical research.

James Pietris, Stephen Bacchi, Sebastian Wiech, Yiran Tan · 8 authors

No abstract is available for this record.

Stefano Marzo, Royston Pinto, Lucy McKenna, Rob Brennan

Federated learning (FL) is a distributed machine learning<br> approach that enables remote devices i.e. workers to collaborate to compute<br> the fitting of a neural network model without sharing their data.<br> While this method is favorable to ensure data privacy, an imbalanced<br> data distribution can introduce unfairness in the model training, causing<br> discriminatory bias towards certain under-represented groups. In this paper,<br> we show that imbalance federated data decreases indexes of equity<br> i.e. differences in treatment for underrepresented classes. To address the<br> problem, we propose a federated learning framework called Z-Fed that 1)<br> balances the training without exchange of privacy protected data using<br> a zero knowledge proof (ZKP) technique, and 2) allows for the collection<br> of information on data distributions based on one or more categorical<br> features to produce metadata about population proportions. The proposed<br> framework infers the precise data distribution without exchanging<br> knowledge of the data categories and uses it to coordinate a balanced<br> training set. Z-Fed aims to mitigate the effect of imbalanced data in<br> FL while respecting privacy and without using mediators or probabilistic<br> approaches. Compared to a non-balanced framework, Z-Fed improves<br> fairness and equality measured in equal opportunities (EPD) by 53.54%,<br> equal odds (EOD) by 56.41%, and statistical parity (SPD) by 46.1% on<br> imbalanced UTK datasets, reducing biased predictions among subgroups.<br> EPD, EOD, and SPD measure the disparity of treatment between privileged<br> e.g. over-represented and non-privileged groups. Given the results<br> obtained, Z-Fed can reduce discriminatory behaviors and enhance trustworthy<br> of federated learning.

Alain Hennebelle, Leila Ismail, Huned Materwala, Juma Al Kaabi · 6 authors

Diabetes Mellitus, one of the leading causes of death worldwide, has no cure to date and can lead to severe health complications, such as retinopathy, limb amputation, cardiovascular diseases, and neuronal disease, if left untreated. Consequently, it becomes crucial to take precautionary measures to avoid/predict the occurrence of diabetes. Machine learning approaches have been proposed and evaluated in the literature for diabetes prediction. This paper proposes an IoT-edge-Artificial Intelligence (AI)-blockchain system for diabetes prediction based on risk factors. The proposed system is underpinned by the blockchain to obtain a cohesive view of the risk factors data from patients across different hospitals and to ensure security and privacy of the user's data. Furthermore, we provide a comparative analysis of different medical sensors, devices, and methods to measure and collect the risk factors values in the system. Numerical experiments and comparative analysis were carried out between our proposed system, using the most accurate random forest (RF) model, and the two most used state-of-the-art machine learning approaches, Logistic Regression (LR) and Support Vector Machine (SVM), using three real-life diabetes datasets. The results show that the proposed system using RF predicts diabetes with 4.57% more accuracy on average compared to LR and SVM, with 2.87 times more execution time. Data balancing without feature selection does not show significant improvement. The performance is improved by 1.14% and 0.02% after feature selection for PIMA Indian and Sylhet datasets respectively, while it reduces by 0.89% for MIMIC III.

Veronika Stephanie, Ibrahim Khalil, Mohammed Atiquzzaman, Xun Yi

The advancement of internet and communication technologies has led to the era of Industry 4.0. This shift is followed by healthcare industries creating the term Healthcare 4.0. In Healthcare 4.0, the use of Internet of Things-enabled medical imaging devices for early disease detection has enabled medical practitioners to increase healthcare institutions' quality of service. However, Healthcare 4.0 is still lagging in artificial intelligence and big data compared to other Industry 4.0 due to data privacy concerns. In addition, institutions' diverse storage and computing capabilities restrict institutions from incorporating the same training model structure. This article presents a secure multiparty computation-based ensemble federated learning with blockchain that enables heterogeneous models to collaboratively learn from healthcare institutions' data without violating users' privacy. Blockchain properties also allow the party to enjoy data integrity without trust in a centralized server while also providing each healthcare institution with auditability and version control capability.

SACHI CHAUDJARY, Riya Kakkar, Rajesh Gupta, Sudeep Tanwar · 6 authors

The advent of telemedicine with its remote surgical procedures has effectively transformed the working of healthcare professionals. The evolution of telemedicine facilitates the remote monitoring of patients that lead to the advent of telesurgery systems, i.e. one of the most critical applications in telemedicine systems. Apart from gaining popularity, the telesurgery system may encounter security and trust issues of patients? data while communicating with the surgeon for their remote treatment. Motivated by this, we have presented a comprehensive survey on secure telesurgery systems comprising healthcare, surgical robots, traditional telesurgery systems, and the role of artificial intelligence to deal with the numerous security attacks associated with the patients' health data. Furthermore, we propose a blockchain and federated learning-based secure telesurgery system to secure the communication between patient and surgeon. The results of the proposed system are better than those of the traditional system in terms of improved latency, low data storage cost, and enhanced data offloading. Finally, we explore the research challenges and issues associated with the telesurgery system.

Abdulhammed Opeyemi Babatunde, Taofeeq Oluwatosin Togunwa, Olutola Awosiku, Mohd Faizan Siddiqui · 8 authors

OPINION article Front. Public Health, 24 October 2022Sec. Digital Public Health Volume 10 - 2022 | https://doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2022.1024203

Sebastian Griewing, Michael Lingenfelder, Uwe Wagner, Niklas Gremke

This study aims at evaluating the use case potential of breast cancer care for artificial intelligence and blockchain technology application based on the patient data analysis at Marburg University Hospital and, thereupon, developing a digital workflow for breast cancer care. It is based on a retrospective descriptive data analysis of all in-patient breast and ovarian cancer patients admitted at the Department of Gynecology of Marburg University Hospital within the five-year observation period of 2017 to 2021. According to the German breast cancer guideline, the care workflow was visualized and, thereon, the digital concept was developed, premised on the literature foundation provided by a Boolean combination open search. Breast cancer cases display a lower average patient case complexity, fewer secondary diagnoses, and performed procedures than ovarian cancer. Moreover, 96% of all breast cancer patients originate from a city with direct geographical proximity. Estimated circumference and total catchment area of ovarian present 28.6% and 40% larger, respectively, than for breast cancer. The data support invasive breast cancer as a preferred use case for digitization. The digital workflow based on combined application of artificial intelligence as well as blockchain or distributed ledger technology demonstrates potential in tackling senological care pain points and leveraging patient data safety and sovereignty.

Hemang Subramanian

BACKGROUND Wearable devices have limited ability to store and process such data. Currently, individual users or data aggregators are unable to monetize or contribute such data to wider analytics use cases. When combined with clinical health data, such data can improve the predictive power of data-driven analytics and can proffer many benefits to improve the quality of care. We propose and provide a marketplace mechanism to make these data available while benefiting data providers. OBJECTIVE We aimed to propose the concept of a decentralized marketplace for patient-generated health data that can improve provenance, data accuracy, security, and privacy. Using a proof-of-concept prototype with an interplanetary file system (IPFS) and Ethereum smart contracts, we aimed to demonstrate decentralized marketplace functionality with the blockchain. We also aimed to illustrate and demonstrate the benefits of such a marketplace. METHODS We used a design science research methodology to define and prototype our decentralized marketplace and used the Ethereum blockchain, solidity smart-contract programming language, the web3.js library, and node.js with the MetaMask application to prototype our system. RESULTS We designed and implemented a prototype of a decentralized health care marketplace catering to health data. We used an IPFS to store data, provide an encryption scheme for the data, and provide smart contracts to communicate with users on the Ethereum blockchain. We met the design goals we set out to accomplish in this study. CONCLUSIONS A decentralized marketplace for trading patient-generated health data can be created using smart-contract technology and IPFS-based data storage. Such a marketplace can improve quality, availability, and provenance and satisfy data privacy, access, auditability, and security needs for such data when compared with centralized systems.