Presentation of “Comprehensive Guidelines on Blockchain Applications in Health”

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26 Jan 2021
Group(s) submitting the application: 
Meeting objectives: 

This session aims at presenting and discuss within the Blockchain WG members and the RDA community the final report on the Blockchain Applications in Health WG, which concludes its activities.

The final WG report will include the “state of the Art” report on blockchain use-cases in the healthcare domain and relevant initiatives, initially discussed at P13 in Philadelphia and subsequently updated in the following sessions, and the report on Regulatory and Legal issues initially discussed at P14 in Helsinki. The final report will thus illustrate a set of Guidelines for blockchain design and implementation in different use cases, based on lessons learnt from concrete experiences in the healthcare domain and on the analyses developed within the WG during dedicated TCs and former meetings. These guidelines will build upon a decision tree, based also on established best practices provided by real world examples, highlighting when a blockchain solution in the health domain can make sense. The guidelines will aim at facilitating the assessment of blockchain usability in selected and specific use cases, starting from the evaluation of the use cases’ requirements, eventually allowing the selection of the most appropriate design of a blockchain solution for a given use case.

The session will also discuss how to disseminate the Guidelines as outcome of the WG activity and how to ensure a possible follow-up, building on the WG’s results.

Meeting agenda: 

Collaborative meeting notes: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1pnxlzBRvJfY4aanjA8e8Ezm8CNpM0LDz4X2e...

  • Brief introduction to the WG and work plan description
  • Presentation of the group’s last report on ‘comprehensive guidelines on Blockchain Applications in Health
  • Discussion with participants on the provided Guidelines and on the next steps related to dissemination and adoption of the Guidelines
Target Audience: 

For this session, we invite Healthcare Data Scientists dealing with data licensing and patient privacy issues, distributed system experts, privacy and security researchers from informatics and computer science, Policy-makers for Healthcare, Health bioinformatics legal experts, Healthcare and Health Maintenance Organisation administrators, Clinicians (to use data technology to improve practice), Biomedical researchers (using analytical techniques), Pharmaceutical industry researchers and manufacturers, Medical equipment researchers and manufacturers, in silico modelling, testing and clinical trial experts and other interested professionals.

Group chair serving as contact person: 
Brief introduction describing the activities and scope of the group: 

The Blockchain Applications in Health WG was promoted by the Health Data IG in order to focus on Blockchain in Health data, with special regard to the potential of such a technology  in enabling data sharing while ensuring compliance with advanced data protection requirements (such as those defined, for instance, by the EU General Data Protection Regulation – GDPR).

After two BoFs held at P9 in Barcelona and at P10 in Montreal, with rising interest in the RDA community, the WG was endorsed and had its first official meeting at P12 in Gaborone, while at P13 in Philadelphia the first goal described in the case statement – the “State of Art report” – was presented and discussed.

The Plenary in Helsinki (P14) was the occasion for further developing the outcomes of the meeting held at P13 and for addressing the second goal provided in the case statement, namely the report on legal regulatory issues, while the Virtual Plenary 16 (Costarica) was the occasion to wrap-up and get prepared for this final meeting.

The final goal of the WG (after 18 months) is to provide a set of comprehensive guidelines on Blockchain Applications in Health.

Short Group Status: 

Recognised & endorsed. At P17 the Blockchain Applications in Health WG will present and discuss the final deliverable concluding its activities.

Type of Meeting: 
Informative meeting
Avoid conflict with the following group (1): 
Avoid conflict with the following group (2): 
Meeting presenters: 
Edwin Morley-Fletcher, Mirko De Maldé, Ludovica Durst