One of the critical aspects of collecting and processing health-related data is to share it between stakeholders securely. As health information is one of the most regulated types of data, the use of IoT devices to collect and transmit information demands exceptional security and privacy considerations.
Every year, new IoT devices enter the healthcare market. Connecting those often requires device-specific platforms, making it difficult to scale, especially on patients with a combination of different systems.
HL7 FHIR, or Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources, is an open-standard data model for secure and private health data exchange. It allows the transfer of healthcare information between healthcare providers, patients, caregivers, payers, researchers, and anyone else involved in the healthcare ecosystem.
Microsoft Azure API for FHIR already provides a secure, simplified management solution for rapidly exchanging information between existing data sources, such as electronic health record systems and research databases.
Now, the Azure IoT Connector for FHIR (in preview) allows managing the ever-expanding personal biometric data resulting from the proliferation of wearables and other medical devices.
As telemedicine services are fast growing because of the current health crisis, the massive amount of IoT collected data creates new opportunities with analytics, machine learning, and actionable intelligence. To use the gathered data, however, compliance with strict regulations such as HIPAA and GDPR is required. To accomplish that, the Azure IoT Connector for FHIR is built on the HITRUST certified Azure platform.
Developers of medical IoT devices need not worry about creating their secure pipelines from scratch. They can now quickly and easily set up a collection conduit, designed for security and privacy, to transmit Protected Health Information (PHI) from IoT devices.
“Using the Azure IoT Connector for FHIR will open up new remote care paths for patients living with chronic conditions. Being able to make decisions with data coming in real time from home devices will be the game changer for improving the quality and timeliness of patient care.” says Marc Willard, Senior Vice President of Digital Health and Analytics at Humana.
Key features of the Azure IoT Connector for FHIR include:
- Conversion of biometric data (such as blood glucose, heart rate, or pulse ox) from connected devices into FHIR resources.
- Scalability and real-time data processing.
- Seamless integration with Azure IoT solutions and Azure Stream Analytics.
- Role-based Access Control (RBAC) allows for managing access to device data at scale in Azure API for FHIR.
- Audit log tracking for data flow.
- Helps with compliance in the cloud: ISO 27001:2013 certified, supports HIPAA and GDPR, and built on the HITRUST certified Azure platform.
Heather Jordan Cartwright, General Manager, Microsoft Healthcare, says “Microsoft has expanded the tools in our FHIR ecosystem to include IoT pipelines, so our customers have easy to use, interconnected tools for responsibly managing patient health data. Whether you’re building clinical applications, analytics engines, or developing artificial intelligence (AI) with telehealth and remote monitoring, we want to make sure you have pipelines for PHI data with security in mind.”