Why NFTs, crypto and blockchain can help e-health thrive

A medical ecosystem has revealed how it is shaking up the way patients are treated — all while ensuring that healthcare data is used to its full potential.

Speaking in an ask-me-anything session with Cointelegraph, Aimedis said that its cutting-edge ecosystem is designed to benefit everyone.

Based on the blockchain, it aims to bring together a range of e-health applications — including prescriptions, medical records, video chats, appointments and second opinions — all while allowing patients to connect the smart watches that store their data.

Aimedis also plans to turn anonymized medical data into NFTs. This can then be purchased by pharmaceutical companies, or used for machine learning as artificial intelligence is increasingly used to deliver better patient outcomes.

Ben El Idrissi, the COO and co-founder, said Aimedis was created out of necessity because he has seen the problems plaguing the global healthcare sector first hand.

“We deeply believe that there’s a huge benefit in the digitization of healthcare — not only to the ones who work in the space but for patients as well,” he added.

The benefits

Michael J Kaldasch, a fellow co-founder of Aimedis who works as CEO, said that a common question the company is related to why it is trying to bring everything together in one place.

In response, he says that healthcare IT is not comparable to normal IT — and that everything needs to be brought together, with one login, one user interface and one user experience.

He argued that separate apps based on which condition a person has simply wouldn’t work — using an analogy of a shopping mall that brings together a number of different brands together.

“The patient has their own access to their part of our blockchain — they can follow up exactly who accessed their data, who uploaded this PDF, who uploaded that X-ray, who accessed my emergency files, and why did this person access my records? This gives an additional level of trust,” he said.

Aimedis plans to turn medical data into NFTs that have a standardized structure — and the platform will allow these tokens to be sold for a fixed price or at auctions. It’s hoped that this could open new revenue streams for patients — especially those in poorer regions.

“AI will be the future – not only in medicine but in every industry. Machine learning is always dependent on high-quality data. With these NFTs, we will have high-quality data – always in the same structure, reliable,” he said.

There’s an app for that

During the AMA, the Aimedis executives were asked about Apple and Google — both of which have close relationships with end users through the health applications offered on smartwatches and smartphones.

El Idrissi said that he doesn’t believe these tech giants are a competitor. In fact, he imagines that — in the future, they may work with Aimedis or buy them out.

Kaldasch added that the services offered by Apple and Google are crucial right now, explaining: “The healthcare system is absolutely insufficient. A lot of people don’t go to hospital at the moment because they are afraid of infecting themselves with coronavirus — and they are staying at home but they are not in contact with doctors. So what do you do? You have to have services like Aimedis.”

The company is also planning to launch a virtual hospital and rehab, with a modern hospital information system that is less expensive than the status quo.

“It will be fun to use. You see where the patient is moving inside a hospital, you can see which bed the patient lies in,” Kaldasch said. “That way, the staff are always up to date. You can also assign tasks so doctors and nurses get messages on their smartwatch. That way, you improve the patient journey a lot — and you involve the patient and their relatives because they can log in and see what their care plan is.”