Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Company – du has collaborated with UAE NMC Healthcare in order to implement Electronic Health Records using blockchain technology, as reported by ITP.net.

The blockchain applications to Electronic Health Records (EHR) will help in the management of patient information within the country. It will prove to be beneficial since blockchain will bring data integrity, security and the trust to permit sensitive patient information flow between health providers and patients.

“Today, a majority of health records are on paper such as blood test reports, x-rays, etc. Most hospitals don't have shared access to patients' records which is inconvenient to the patient and time-consuming at the end for the doctor or the care-giver,” Carlos Domingo, chief new business & innovation officer at du, said. “By digitizing all health records, and putting them in blockchain technology, data can be shared and distributed across all hospitals. We are looking at fully digitizing the health system with blockchain technology to assure data integrity with zero error and guarantee end to end accountability of the patients' records."

With the collaboration, NMC Healthcare will be able to record, store and retrieve the medical health records in a secure manner that will in turn provide the patients with smooth and secure interactions. The blockchain technology will be provided through du’s partnership with the firm Guardtime that implemented blockchain in Estonia.

“We believe the results of this initiative shall improve our patients' data management processes, reduce administrative costs and also help us in serving our patients in a further effective manner with accurate information for better diagnosis and treatment,” Dr. B.R. Shetty, founder and CEO of NMC Healthcare, stated.

Du is a member of the Global Blockchain Council (GBC) that was established to accelerate blockchain technology in UAE. In June last year, Du collaborated with GBC to test the applications of blockchain in identity and authentication systems.