Improving patient safety, health data accuracy, and remote self-management of health through the establishment of a biometric-based global UHID

Authors

Guy Hembroff, Michigan Technological UniversityFollow

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

1-1-2016

Department

Department of Applied Computing; Center for Cybersecurity

Abstract

Healthcare systems globally continue to face challenges surrounding patient identification. Consequences of misidentification include incomplete and inaccurate electronic patient health records potentially jeopardizing patients' safety, a significant amount of cases of medical fraud because of inadequate identification mechanisms, and difficulties affiliated with the value of remote health self-management application data being aggregated accurately into the user's Electronic Health Record (EHR). We introduce a new technique of user identification in healthcare capable of establishing a global identifier. Our research has developed algorithms capable of establishing a Unique Health Identifier (UHID) based on the user's fingerprint biometric, with the utilization of facial-recognition as a secondary validation step before health records can be accessed. Biometric captures are completed using standard smartphones and Web cameras in a touchless method. We present a series of experiments to demonstrate the formation of an accurate, consistent, and scalable UHID. We hope our solution will aid in the reduction of complexities associated with user misidentification in healthcare resulting in lowering costs, enhancing population health monitoring, and improving patient-safety.

Publisher's Statement

© 2016 The authors and IOS Press. Article deposited here in compliance with publisher policies. Publisher's version of record: https://doi.org/10.3233/978-1-61499-712-2-42

Publication Title

Studies in health technology and informatics

Recommended Citation

Hembroff, G. (2016). Improving patient safety, health data accuracy, and remote self-management of health through the establishment of a biometric-based global UHID. Studies in health technology and informatics, 231, 42-53. http://doi.org/10.3233/978-1-61499-712-2-42
Retrieved from: https://digitalcommons.mtu.edu/michigantech-p/734

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

Version

Publisher's PDF