Cross-chain Sharing of Personal Health Records: Heterogeneous and Interoperable Blockchains

With the widespread adoption of medical informatics, a wealth of valuable personal health records (PHR) has been generated. Concurrently, blockchain technology has enhanced the security of medical institutions. However, these institutions often function as isolated data silos, limiting the potential value of PHRs. As the demand for data sharing between hospitals on different blockchains grows, addressing the challenge of cross-chain data sharing becomes crucial. When sharing PHRs across blockchains, the limited storage and computational capabilities of medical Internet of Things (IoT) devices complicate the storage of large volumes of PHRs and the handling of complex calculations. Additionally, varying blockchain cryptosystems and the risk of internal attacks further complicate the cross-chain sharing of PHRs. This paper proposes a scheme for sharing PHRs across heterogeneous and interoperable blockchains. Medical IoT devices can encrypt and store real-time PHRs in an InterPlanetary File System, requiring only simple operations for data sharing. An enhanced proxy re-encryption(PRE) algorithm addresses the differences in blockchain cryptosystems. Multi-dimensional analysis demonstrates that this scheme offers robust security and excellent performance.