Advancing Medical Innovation Through Blockchain-Secured Federated Learning for Smart Health

Salabat Khan, Mansoor Khan, Muhammad Asghar Khan, Lu Wang, Kaishun Wu

Abstract: The rapid digitization of healthcare systems has led to a vast accumulation of electronic medical records (EMRs), offering an invaluable source of patient data that can significantly advance medical research and improve patient care. However, sharing EMRs for research purposes presents challenges, particularly concerning data privacy, security, and the limitations of traditional centralized data-sharing models. This paper introduces a novel approach that leverages blockchain technology to facilitate federated learning with EMRs, thereby addressing these challenges. Federated learning enables multiple institutions to collaboratively train a robust machine learning model without sharing raw data, preserving privacy and security. By integrating blockchain, this framework enhances data integrity, immutability, and trust, all in a decentralized environment. Blockchain serves as a transparent and secure ledger, recording model updates and aggregating them through a consensus-based mechanism. Smart contracts further enforce data usage policies, allowing only authorized access and maintaining control over data ownership and sharing. This approach empowers medical researchers and institutions to collaborate more effectively, accelerating the discovery of treatments, advancements in personalized medicine, and insights into rare diseases. It also enables patients to contribute to medical research while retaining control over their personal data, fostering a patient-centered approach to healthcare innovation. Experimental results confirm the efficacy and efficiency of this blockchain-enabled federated learning framework, highlighting its potential to transform medical research and adhere to stringent privacy and security standards. This study emphasizes the pivotal role of blockchain in enhancing Big Data analytics within healthcare, paving the way for improved collaboration, innovation, and patient outcomes.