One of the Major Pitfalls in Today's Healthcare Industry is the Long Waiting Periods for Appointments or Procedures. Here's How the Healthureum will Tackle it is Once Fully Implemented

I bet you have visited a hospital once in your life and ended up getting worse in the waiting area as the institution waits for either the doctor to arrive or as you wait for your turn. These waiting periods are notably worse in an emergency situation where the Healthcare organization is required to not only record the patient’s medical data but also confirm if they have any insurance.

Lack of insurance coverage might see a patient wait for hours on end in agony as they solicit funds from relatives and friends who in most instances are unwilling or unable to help. Not to mention, healthcare facilities offer different services because of the lack of proper infrastructure. In these modern times, a hospital is supposed to have both the expertise from qualified medical practitioners and the help of technological innovations such as 3D printing or artificial intelligence for accurate diagnosis and better treatment plans.

However, the healthcare facilities with these improvements are costly which prompts most patients to opt for cheaper but riskier methods of treatment. Most hospitals do not have access to these innovations and end up relying on the human workforce to complete all the tasks required at the hospital. This overreliance is not only tiring but can also result in wrong diagnoses or mixed up treatment plans which further add to the patient’s waiting time.

However, the project will mitigate the diversity in Healthcare service and significantly reduce a patient’s waiting time thanks to the following measures.

Better Data Recording and Distribution

After visiting a hospital, all patients are required to provide their details alongside some medical history to give the doctor a better understanding of their condition. This information also comes in handy when deciding on the best treatment plans considering some pre-existing conditions might affect the cure intended for a different ailment. However, seeing that most hospitals use EHR systems, which are slow and ununiformed across different healthcare institutions, to record and store data, the waiting period for patients is exponentially increased.

The Healthureum system will use Blockchain technology to record and distribute patient data. However, unlike in previous systems where your medical information was handled by the hospital, patients will be in charge of accessing their data and permitting hospitals or a doctor to have a look. Not to mention, this technology will standardize the way data is recorded and stored across all healthcare institutions across the globe, and its retrieval will be quick.

As such, patients won’t have to wait for hours as hospital personnel navigate masses of data on outdated computers or peruse bundles of files just to find one with your name on it.

Infrastructure Upgrade

As mentioned in the introduction, the unavailability of proper medical infrastructure is a significant cause of extended waiting periods. As such, patients not only wait for hours before they can get treated seeing the machines are otherwise preoccupied but also spend more time traveling from remote areas to a healthcare facility with the best, or at least better infrastructure. Even after arriving at some of these hospitals, the machines might not be working due to poor maintenance.

The Healthureum project will use blockchain technology to assess and record all actions related to specific pieces of medical infrastructure. As such, healthcare facilities will be able to schedule and run maintenance checks on time regarding the waiting period for patients and demand. This information is vital for both building confidence and serving patients on time eliminating excruciating waiting periods.

Online Video consultations and Referrals

Online video consultations are perhaps the best thing in medical institutions since the invention of cancer treatments. While there might be no apparent cure on the market, certain inventions made it easier to manage the disease or even cure it in its early stages. With online video consultations, patients will be able to avoid the long queues in hospitals as they wait for their turn to see the doctor.

While some people might be facing life and death situations, others might be only visiting the hospitals for a progress checkup, which does not justify hours in the waiting area. Medical practitioners will also be able to offer referrals to patients who are located in remote regions reducing both their expense and saving them time. With areas such as Japan experiencing a doctor to patient ratio of one to 2,000 back in 2012, online video consultations and referrals powered by the Healthureum project are the best options thus far for reducing waiting periods in hospitals.

Doctors who offer consultations and referrals will also be rewarded using HTH tokens (the official form of currency on the Healthureum ecosystem), which will motivate them to liaise with each other in a bid to reduce their doctor to patient ratio and their patient’s waiting hours. More information visit https://www.healthureum.io/