Healium - On-Chain Hospital Billing System dApp

Healium is an on-chain hospital billing system that leverages blockchain technology to revolutionize the billing process in the healthcare industry. Traditional hospital billing systems often involve manual processes and are susceptible to fraud, resulting in significant financial losses. By utilizing blockchain and smart contracts, Healium aims to streamline the billing process, increase transparency, mitigate fraud risks, and ultimately make healthcare more accessible, potentially saving lives. 💊🏥💰

Problem

Hospital billing systems continue to rely on manual processes, leaving room for errors, inefficiencies, and fraudulent activities. The National Healthcare Anti-Fraud Association estimates that fraudulent activities in healthcare billing cost tens of billions of dollars annually. The lack of transparency and accountability within these systems poses significant challenges, including excessive charges for routine procedures or billing for unperformed procedures. This situation calls for a modern and secure solution to enhance the billing process and protect patients' interests. ❌💸🤕

Solution

The Healium project introduces an on-chain hospital billing system that utilizes blockchain technology to record transactions and generate bills through smart contracts. This approach offers several benefits:

1. Streamlined Billing Process: By eliminating the need for an intermediary billing department, the Healium dApp simplifies and automates the billing process, reducing administrative overhead and manual errors.

2. Increased Transparency: Through the use of blockchain, patients and medical providers can have transparent access to the billing records, ensuring accurate and accountable billing practices.

3. Fraud Mitigation: By recording transactions on-chain, the risk of fraudulent activities, such as overcharging or billing for unperformed procedures, is significantly reduced. The immutability of the blockchain ensures the integrity of the billing data.

4. Improved Accessibility: By streamlining the billing process and reducing fraudulent practices, Healium aims to make healthcare more accessible to individuals, potentially saving lives by removing financial barriers. ✅📝🚀

Technology Stack

The Healium project utilizes the following technologies:

• Solidity: The programming language for writing smart contracts on the Ethereum blockchain.
• Scaffold-eth: A development framework for building Ethereum dApps.
• Hardhat: A development environment for compiling, testing, and deploying smart contracts.
• Infura: A service that provides access to the Ethereum network.
• Ethers.js: A JavaScript library for interacting with the Ethereum blockchain.
• React.js: A JavaScript library for building user interfaces.
• Express.js: A web application framework for building the backend server.
• MongoDB: A NoSQL database for storing data related to the billing system.

Key Features

• Automated CPT Coding: Healium's on-chain billing system automates the Current Procedural Terminology (CPT) coding process, allowing physicians to easily input medical procedures and automatically match them with appropriate codes.

• Smart Contract Integration: The project deploys a smart contract on the Ethereum Goerli Testnet, enabling users to store, create, and pay patient bills through payable method calls in Solidity.

• Data Integration: Healium integrates with off-chain oracles and CMS.gov to source datasets for CPT codes, pricing information, and human-readable descriptions, ensuring accurate and up-to-date billing information.

Skills

To contribute to the Healium project, the following skills are valuable:

• Solidity: Experience in writing smart contracts using Solidity programming language.
• Ethereum Development: Familiarity with Ethereum, including deployment, interactions, and web3 integration.
• React.js: Proficiency in building user interfaces using React.js.
• Express.js: Knowledge of developing backend servers using Express.js.
• MongoDB: Understanding of working with MongoDB databases