Consent, Prosent and Biomedical Data in the Era of Blockchain – gloknos seminar

Description

*Please note the change of date & time for this event*

All are invited to join us for this event in the ‘cum panis’ seminar series, hosted by gloknos at CRASSH. The ‘cum panis’ seminars are a space to share work currently in progress and break bread (or cake!) with new intellectual companions.

In this session we are joined by Sebastian Porsdam Mann (University of Copenhagen) to hear about his ongoing research. Sebastian is is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Harvard Medical School’s Center for Bioethics and the University of Copenhagen, currently visiting the University of Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics.

Abstract:
Advances in medical and information technologies have led to massive increases in the volume and complexity of medical data, presenting serious problems for traditional models of specific and informed consent to medical research. However, these advances also enable novel ways to securely share and analyse data. This paper introduces one of these advances – blockchain technologies – and argues that they can be used to share medical data in a secure and auditable fashion. Many aspects of consent and data collection, as well as data analysis, can be automated using blockchain-based smart contracts. This paper demonstrates how blockchain technologies can be used to further all three of the bioethical principles underlying consent requirements: the autonomy of patients, by giving them much greater control over their data; beneficence, by greatly facilitating medical research efficiency and by reducing biases and opportunities for errors; and justice, by enabling patients with rare or underresearched conditions to pseudonomously aggregate their data for analysis. Finally, we coin and describe the novel concept of prosent, by which we mean the blockchain-enabled ability of all stakeholders in the research process to pseudonomously contact, request and exchange information with each other, thus radically enhancing the possibilities for scientific engagement.

This event is free to attend, but in order to receive the advance reading material for this session please email to confirm your attendance.

Want to share this event? Download a poster here.

 

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gloknos is initially funded for 5 years by the European Research Council through a Consolidator Grant awarded to Dr Inanna Hamati-Ataya for her project ARTEFACT (2017-2022). ARTEFACT is funded by the European Research Council under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Framework Programme for Research and Innovation (ERC grant agreement no. 724451). For information about gloknos or ARTEFACT please contact the administrator in the first instance.