Figure 1.
Figure 2.
Comparison chart of blockchain networks and the Transaction Fee (Dollars) and Speed (Transaction Per Second)
| Name | Transaction fee (Dollar) | Speed (TPS) |
|---|---|---|
| Ethereum (ETH) | 10 to 100 | 15-30 |
| Tether (USDT) | 1.00 | 15-30 |
| BNB | 1.00 | 1000 |
| Solana (SOL) | 0.01 | 65,000 |
| XRP | 0.01 | 1,500 |
| Avalanche (AVAX) | 0.01 - 0.05 | 4500+ |
| TRON (TRX) | 0.001 - 0.005 | 2000+ |
| Polkadot (DOT) | 0.01 - 0.10 | 1000+ |
| Polygon (MATIC) | 0.001 - 0.005 | 7500+ |
| Bitcoin Cash (BCH) | 0.001 - 0.05 | 60+ |
| Cosmos (ATOM) | 0.01 - 0.10 | 100+ |
| Stacks (STX) | 0.01 - 0.10 | 30+ |
| Ethereum Classic (ETC) | 0.01 - 0.10 | 15+ |
| Hedera (HBAR) | 0.0001 - 0.001 | 10,000+ |
| NEAR Protocol | 0.01 - 0.05 | 4000+ |
Types of Blockchain
| Pubic Blockchain | Private Blockchain | Consortium Blockchain | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Permission | Public | Private | Public or Private |
| Organization | Decentralized | Partially Decentralized | Almost Decentralized |
| Security | High | Medium | Medium |
| Cost | High | Medium | Low |
| Identity | Anonymous | Identified | Identified |
| Example | Bitcoin, Ethereum | Company internal | Hyperledger, Corda |
Comparison chart of blockchain implementations in healthcare
| Name | Year | public/private BC | Framework | Language implementation |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| MedRec[58] | 2016 | Private blockchain (permissioned) | Ethereum, PyEthereum | Solidity (for smart contracts) |
| Medicalchain[59] | 2018 | Public blockchain (permissioned for certain features) | Hyperledger Fabric | Go (Golang) |
| SimplyVital Health | 2017 | Public blockchain (permissioned for certain features) | Ethereum blockchain | Solidity (for smart contracts) |
| ProvChain[60] | 2017 | Not specified (proprietary implementation) | Private Permissioned | platform-independent library |
| Patientory[61] | 2015 | Private blockchain (permissioned) | Ethereum blockchain | PTOY and solidity |
| IBM Blockchain Healthcare[62] | 2017 | Private blockchain (permissioned) | Hyperledger Fabric | Go (Golang) |
| Gem Health Network | 2016 | Public blockchain (permissioned for certain features) | Ethereum blockchain | Solidity (for smart contracts) |
| Hashed Health | 2016 | Private blockchain (permissioned) | Hyperledger Fabric | Go (Golang) |
| Tierion | 2015 | Public blockchain (anchoring data to Bitcoin blockchain) | Bitcoin blockchain | JavaScript |
| Factom | 2015 | Public blockchain (Factom Protocol) | Factom Protocol | Go (Golang) |
| MedicalDao | 2017 | Public blockchain (permissioned) | Ethereum blockchain | Solidity (for smart contracts) |
| Health Nexus | 2018 | Public blockchain (permission for certain features) | Ethereum blockchain | Solidity (for smart contracts) |
| Blockchain Health Co. | 2017 | Not specified (likely a mix of public and private) | Ethereum blockchain | Solidity (for smart contracts) |
| MediBloc[63] | 2017 | Public blockchain(MediBloc Network) | Ethereum blockchain | Solidity (for smart contracts) |
| Nebula Genomics[64] | 2018 | Public blockchain (Gene-Chain) | Ethereum blockchain | Solidity (for smart contracts) |
Distributed Ledger Technology Key benefits and use cases in bio medical healthcare
| Distributed Ledger Technology Key benefits | Improve medical record management | Enhance insurance claim process | Accelerate Research | Advance healthcare data |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Decentralized Management | The distributed ledger technology and digital wallets enable patients to manage their health record online. This removes all obstacles for gaining access or transferring of their medical data to another healthcare provider [66]. | Real time claim processing becomes easy and transparent by replacing the health plan intermediation with transparent blockchain technology [67]. | Institutions can keep full control of their computational resources while collaborating with other institutes by sharing data and analysis [68]. | Decentralized health data becomes the backbone for digital health, incorporating data from patient-based and EMR systems to provide a data-pool, from which authorized users can access it [69]. |
| Immutable Audit Trail | The data is unalterable, the stored data on private blockchain cannot be changed by anybody including healthcare providers and patients [70]. | Based on blockchain immutability, claim auditing and fraud detection becomes more smooth for the payer and insurers [71]. | Personal patient generated data with timestamp is available, this trackable data is available to research[72]. | The distributed network of nodes contains the timestamped, tamper proof, continuously updated data. This could be adapted for basic and experimental model science. |
| Data Provenance | The medical records are verifiable and signed by the source, false records are plausibly denied [73]. | The distributed Ledger Technology can address the problem of distributed nature of records with blockchain[74]. | The MedRec Blockchian based health record and medical research data is enabled with crucial properties of provenance [75]. | Altered and low quality medicine can be tracked and identified. Using blockchain the origin of the medicine product can be traced and transfer of ownership is clear and available to everyone [72]. |
| Robustness/Availability | Decentralized network advantage is that no single institution can be hacked or robbed to obtain a large number of patient records [66]. | Enhance accessibility of patient data through decentralized ledger with online data access [71]. | Healthcare data availability across the globe online for research and advancement of science and technology with decentralized blockchain networks. Real time data is accessible to improve emergency medical situations [76]. | Blockchain enabled anti tampering capabilities during manufacturing, supply and disposition systems, which could make drug counterfeiting a non-issue [71]. |
| Security/Privacy | The data is encrypted and only accessible with the private key of the patient. Even if the network is infiltrated the data is not readable [66]. | Financial information is secured with the block chain mechanism [71]. | Individuals, healthcare providers, healthcare entities and medical researchers share vast amounts of genetic, diet, lifestyle, environmental and health data with security and privacy protection [76]. | Patient centric consent management system. |