Since 2016, the IOTA Foundation has been leading a concentrated effort to apply its Tangle distributed ledger network to the public sector, with a strong focus on eHealth. Now, in partnership with leading Norwegian healthcare providers such as Olso Medtech, the Norwegian Centre for E-Health Research, and Oslo Cancer Cluster, the IOTA Foundation and Alpha Venturi are working together to form a new Distributed Ledger Technology research network.

Norway’s Digital Society

Fast to adopt new digital technologies (Norway is one of the countries leading the race towards a fully cashless society), the Norwegian people have become staunch supporters of blockchain and distributed ledger based technologies. Skandianbanken Norway recently integrated Bitcoin functionality into its online accounts, and the capital city Oslo held a Blockchain Day in April 2017. This DLT-focused research network comes hot on the heels of the Distributed Ledgers in eHealth event, hosted by Oslo Medtech which included experts from across Europe as well as the European Union Commission.

Distributed Ledgers in eHealth

Thanks to the rapid digitization of medical records and advances in medical technology, the budding field of eHealth has seen significant growth in recent years. With initiatives such as data scientists turning to machine learning to improve diagnostics and detect cancer, to using social media networks to predict the spread of the flu and other viruses, it’s no surprise the industry is intently exploring blockchain and distributed ledger tech as a means to continue developing.

Distributed ledger networks like IOTA’s Tangle are seen as an opportunity to overcome the interoperability challenges professionals in eHealth are currently facing. Along with the founding partners of the DLT research network, IOTA is well positioned to tackle complex issues ranging from insurance and payments processing to sharing digital healthcare data in a reliable, secure manner. This research network could very well be the first step in achieving a distributed ledged-based eHealth infrastructure with the potential to, “promote the development of precision medicine, advance medical research, and invite patients to be more accountable for their health,” according to research from HealthIT.gov.

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