FHIR Station: a central point of contact for controlled and secure data disclosure

The FHIR Station gives you a central point of contact to unlock various data sources in your healthcare organisation for applications and services that support FHIR. Equipped with a strict security framework, the FHIR Station allows you to take the necessary measures to ensure patient privacy and data security.

With the FHIR Station, your organisation is fully prepared for the data exchange of the future: sharing with other healthcare institutions and the government (in Belgium, including laboratory results), communicating with patients, interacting with (mobile) health apps and AI services, etc.

Technological advances mean that healthcare institutions are generating more and more data. As a result, there is a massive volume of interesting and useful data scattered across numerous sources. To exploit its full potential, you need to be able to unlock it efficiently. And, if possible, in a centralised and controlled way that considers both data security and respect for patient privacy.

Does it sound idealistic? Perhaps: but it is, in fact, completely possible.

Fast and controlled data sharing

With Amaron’s FHIR Station, healthcare institutions have a central and uniform point of contact to query various underlying modelled data sources (HL7 and others) in a FHIR-compliant way, enabling them to unlock data quickly and in a controlled manner for applications and services that support FHIR.

This solution standardises communication between various data sources, but hides the complexity. All translations take place transparently, without any end-user intervention.

All the trimmings

FHIR Station provides all the functionality you need, with a robust security framework, a module for pseudonymising and de-identifying patient data, a customised internal governance process, and monitoring of all activities.

• Robust security framework:
  Authorised users have a clear interface to define fine-grained access rules for unlocking data in a controlled and secure way, according to the FHIR standard. For example, you can share only specific patient data linked to clinical admissions during a specific period.
• Pseudonymisation and de-identification of patient data:
  You can seamlessly combine the above security rules with algorithms that guarantee the de-identification and pseudonymisation of sensitive patient information.  You then remove (or replace) the personal data that can be traced back to the patient, and link the remaining data to a unique code that can only be traced back to the specific patient in the hospital. This way, you not only ensure controlled access to medical data, but can also share patient data with other parties while respecting patient privacy.
  
• Tailor-made internal governance process:
  You can define the various steps each role (DPO, IT department, ethics committee etc.) needs to take to grant access to a data source in compliance with applicable regulations (GDPR etc.), and make this process enforceable. The entire process is also documented and thus demonstrable.
• Monitoring of all activities:
  Any interaction with the FHIR Station is carefully recorded in a central audit component for all incoming and outgoing data streams. In other words, you can always check who interacts with what personal data, and when. If unusual behaviour is detected, you can intervene immediately if necessary.