Self-Managed digital identity: Opportunities in the helath system

On June 20, at the offices of our colleagues at Izertis, there was a session on self-managed digital identity and business opportunities with eIDAS2, in which we had the pleasure of participating. During the session, our president Javier Colás highlighted the importance of digital identity in transforming the health system. He emphasized that the increase in complex chronic conditions in people over 60, coupled with increased life expectancy, is threatening the sector’s sustainability, which requires an evolution that prioritizes and promotes more transversal and holistic processes.

During the session, IZERTIS presented its innovative European digital wallet solution, Identfy, which allows the issuance and presentation of verifiable credentials associated with an autonomous and decentralized digital identity, aligned with the new Regulation (EU) 1183/2024, known as “eIDAS 2.0.”. The eIDAS stands for “Identificación Electrónica, Autenticación y Servicios de Confianza”, which translates to Electronic Identification, Authentication, and Trust Services, is a regulation implemented by the European Union to establish a framework for electronic transactions between member states. This regulation is crucial for securely updating digital interactions within the EU, and by improving electronic identification and trust services, it fosters a safer and more flexible environment for utilizing the advantages of digital identities.

The session emphasized the two versions of this regulation and the improvements that the second version presents over the initial one, including new identification and authentication methods, such as the digital identification document in the EUDI Wallet, and the introduction of verifiable credentials that allow sharing only the necessary attributes without revealing unnecessary personal information. Additionally, it promotes self-sovereign digital identity, granting greater control over personal data, and facilitates cross-border interoperability of trust services. The eIDAS 2 extends its application to areas such as the health sector, among others.

Although the incorporation and use of Self-Managed Digital Identity in the health sector have strong arguments, transitioning from the idea/concept/design to reality means facing a maze of technical and cultural challenges, which the new regulation aims to solve. Fortunately, several studies and pilot proposals executed under innovation projects have demonstrated and continue to show that incorporating this technology can be highly beneficial for patients to have full control and knowledge of their sociodemographic and clinical data, and to solve numerous interoperability problems between healthcare centres and health systems. In this way, patients will be able to allow professionals access to their clinical and sociodemographic data whenever necessary, facilitating their usability by different centres and healthcare providers (always with the patient’s consent).

With this objective, the first open-source Spanish digital wallet developed by IZERTIS and approved by the European Commission is being included for the first time in the environment of a global solution for optimizing the care process for patients with advanced heart failure, within the framework of the PCP TIQUE project, a Pre-Commercial Public Procurement led by a European consortium of hospitals. The solution proposed in the project, in which Additum has led the design and conceptualization, as well as promoted the value proposition for optimizing the care process, focuses on real-time monitoring of patients’ conditions, predicting and preventing frequent decompensations, reducing hospital admissions, and optimizing and aligning the care process to improve patient transitions between care levels.

The solution includes functionalities directly linked to the new possibilities offered by the incorporation of digital identity and the issuance of verifiable clinical record credentials, with a first version featuring characteristics such as video call management and care, appointment scheduling and reminders, remote patient monitoring, consent request and signing through self-signed credentials, and onboarding with proof of life to legally identify users. Additionally, the solution facilitates credential issuance by clinical centers, self-issuance of credentials, and signature flow by the patient and credential presentation to trusted third-party clinical entities.

In addition to the focus on digital identity in the health field, along with experts such as Jose Manuel Oliva (Director General of DIGITEL TS), Jesús Ruiz (FIWARE DLT), Julián Inza (President of EAD TRUST), and the team composed of Miguel Ángel Calero, Miguel Ángel Acero, Urko Larrañaga, Cristina Martínez, Eu Cabrera, and Ernesto Espinoza from IZERTIS, fiscal challenges associated with this technology were discussed, and the ease of use for citizens of a digital wallet that can be used as an identity in multiple scenarios was debated.