HELENE: An Open-Source High-Security Privacy-Preserving Blockchain Based System for Automating and Managing Laboratory Health Tests

In the last years, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic, precision medicine platforms emerged as useful tools for supporting new tests like the ones that detect the presence of antibodies and antigens with better sensitivity and specificity than traditional methods. In addition, the pandemic has also influenced the way people interact (decentralization), behave (digital world) and purchase health services (online). Moreover, there is a growing concern in the way health data are managed, especially in terms of privacy. To tackle such issues, this article presents a sustainable direct-to-consumer health-service open-source platform called HELENE that is supported by blockchain and by a novel decentralized oracle that protects patient data privacy. Specifically, HELENE enables health test providers to compete through auctions, allowing patients to bid for their services and to keep the control over their health test results. Moreover, data exchanges among the involved stakeholders can be performed in a trustworthy, transparent and standardized way to ease software integration and to avoid incompatibilities. After providing a thorough description of the platform, the proposed health platform is assessed in terms of smart contract performance. In addition, the response time of the developed oracle is evaluated and NIST SP 800-22 tests are executed to demonstrate the adequacy of the devised random number generator. Thus, this article shows the capabilities and novel propositions of HELENE for delivering health services providing an open-source platform for future researchers, who can enhance it and adapt it to their needs.