The opioid crisis is profitable. Blockchain tech can end that. | Brian Behlendorf | Big Think

The opioid crisis is profitable. Blockchain tech can end that.
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The same way blockchain technology could end the blood diamond trade, it could also stop those profiting from the opioid crisis by removing the traditional opportunities for drug fraud, explains Hyperledger's Brian Behlendorf.

"I tend not to blame the drug taker because I think they're just medicating to meet their needs, it's really the distributors and those writing fake prescriptions and others who are enabling a lot of this crisis, and I think distributed ledger technology can help us understand where there might be abuses in that system."

Blockchain technology could also revolutionize health information systems — from harnessing the IoT to ensure patients take their medication at the right time and often enough (drug adherence is a big problem), to checking the credibility of doctors, and not having to cart around a small filing cabinet of your life's medical records every time you change doctors or providers.
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BRIAN BEHLENDORF:

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TRANSCRIPT:

BRIAN BEHLENDORF: So there's a tremendous amount of fraud in the prescription drug marketplace. And just like with provenance tracking of diamonds or the food supply chain, you can have provenance tracking for pharmaceuticals. You can have a system whereby the drugs — from the time they're manufactured and the batch that they were made in and in the factory they were made in — were tracked in some way that maybe parts of that were public, maybe parts of it were private, but were tracked through the distribution process to the end recipient. Now obviously when we're talking about individual patients and the prescriptions that they get, that is highly sensitive data. That's data that you wouldn't ever store directly in a chain — what your prescription is, what my prescriptions are, that sort of thing — but tracking these objects, tracking these individual vials of a drug or bottles of a drug as they get down to the pharmacy level is something that we can do to try to see: where are there pharmacies that seem to be dispensing a lot more than they should be based on the prescriptions that they're receiving?

Furthermore, finding ways to actually measure, so maybe separate from the opioid crisis but we actually have a challenge of adherence in the drug industry of understanding, for a given prescription drug, who is actually taking that at the times they should be taking it and continuing to take the full regiment rather than stopping halfway through because they felt okay. And so you could see IoT sensor data from the dispenser devices themselves, weaving together a picture that allows us to see all the way from the batch the drug was made in to the people who were prescribed it, and who took it if there is a problem out there, if there is a quality control issue where did that come from, and who might be responsible for that? And correspondingly the patients who do adhere well, are they benefiting from the use of those drugs? Or the ones who are having poor reactions are the ones who are only taking half their prescription? That sort of thing.

Bringing it back to the opioid crisis, I think tracking prescriptions in a system like this, if we can find ways to do it that respect patient confidentiality — because I'm a huge believer in the importance of keeping the patient at the center of who their information is being shared with and on what basis — but if we can build kind of an airtight system for tracking all that and understanding where these prescriptions are going, we'll have a much better basis for discovering fraud, discovering places where there might be fraud, and it's worth deeper investigation, and trying to understand how do we get to — I tend not to blame the drug taker because I think they're just medicating to meet their needs, it's really the distributors and those writing fake prescriptions and others who are enabling a lot of this crisis, and I think distributed ledger technology can help us understand where there might be abuses in that system...

[cwlqgfh]

blockchain is a solution desperately looking for a problem. the hype never ends.

[leealexander]

It would be legitimate pain patients who have already exhausted alternatives, the doctors and pharmacies who would suffer because you know that information will be used against them. There is no such thing as internet privacy because members of our government will violate it with impunity even if no one else does. Between the NSA and data mining politicians, to name only a few culprits, these are the people who would catch the brunt of it in spite of being guilty of nothing although legitimate patients rarely become addicted although they do when they are driven onto the streets in order to get their medications. Addicts are often driven to it by despair as the working class suffers through austerity programs.

[AdAstraCompany]

Nice to see a forward thinking idea like this. The idea of blockchain has the potential to reduce the number of mediums that exist during the transportation of virtually anything

[ANOLDMASTERJUKZ]

Our Beloved Karen Maxcine Yeager was a victim of accidental overdose. We tried to get her to use cannabis for pain management, she was afraid she would lose her health insurance.

[inaciotasse]

This is timely. Patients on many types of medications have a hard time getting off them. This is especially true with psychotropic medications. The current belief is that patients will be taking these medications for the rest of their lives. Gradual withdrawal is not even available to them. They have to go on a withdrawal roller coaster by taking their drugs every second day or breaking tablets and counting the beads. Ridiculous. Health IT is an important part of developing a prescription system for all patients. A supply chain system with the customer in mind. Formulations made for each patient. Prescription plans customised for each patient. It's a tragedy to have so many people taking these damaging drugs long term. It's terrible to subject patients to painful withdrawals as they try to make a withdrawal plan with the standard doses available to them. Research into the possibility of withdrawing people off drugs is not even conducted because the infrastructure isn't there. The other day the news reported of a business making customised packaging for their clothing deliveries to minimise waste. Surely they can do something similar for pharmaceutical drugs.

[cassafrasscubby]

This could be abused, of course, like any system, like every system, but the benefits can far outweigh the abuse with proper oversights and audits. Opioid manufacturers should be held to the strictest standards from start of production to when it reaches the patients hands, as should any medication that people can easily become addicted to, overdose and die from.

[AKrn]

Maybe if people felt that they had more control over the outcome of their lives, if they feel like they're accepted as a part of their society and were given the opportunity to earn a living wage there wouldn't be an opioid drug problem.

[sethjones]

Distributed Ledger Technology: Translation, we put RFID and NFC devices on all of your medical devices and prescription containers so that we can actively monitor your use and we then share this information with 3rd parties to verify you're not supplying this stupid drug war we started.

[marcpadilla]

Don't call em happy pills for nothing. Vicodin, Happy Codone, Pain bad! Happy Good!

[Qweertyyuiiop]

Blockchain can't interact with the real world. Its the oracle problem and it has not been solved.

[PassFissn]

Might be some of things this old technology is good for

[contactyourcongressmen]

This doesn't sound like a solution to opioid crisis. This would only keep track of records put in by doctors who use the system. I assume most wouldn't unless they were legally obligated. And people would still break the law regardless of whether there was this digital ledger out there.

[DelbertStinkfester]

My daughter had a left over bottle of 20 oxycodine. I used them for my knee pain and Holy Crap those things are the only thing that killed my pain....I really liked those things

[ChessMasteryOfficial]

*Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world..*

[squidcaps]

Funny how this is not so big problem in countries that don't have irrational fear about national registries and databases... I mean, the blockchain here is not necessary and doesn't fix the problem: having one centralized database for all your health related data, including your prescriptions. No entry in the database: you ain't got a valid prescription. Ours works so well that it calculates all the rebates and discounts, insurances etc in the cost, renewals happen online, the pharmacy sees all my medication and the system doesn't alerts for duplicates... It is hard to fake a prescription here, also docs just won't give you opioids, not even when you need them. You REALLY have to need them for real before they put you on them.

[estillings]

How does blockchain tell the difference between legit taxed narcotics and deadly untaxed fentanyl from abroad?

[deniz]

A lot of opioids that get into the us come in illegally most times produced in China

[JustOneAsbesto]

Blockchain will give us all free opioids? Sign me up.

[deathbycognitivedissonance]

Looks like the off brand version Christopher Hitchens.

[MucaMacaful]

Vaporware sellers. Blockchain can't solve any of these. Sensors can't either.