Oh baby! Tracking IVF progress on the blockchain

Enterprise blockchain VeChain, in partnership with Shanghai’s Renji Hospital, has announced the launch of a smart medical care project dubbed “MyBaby” — a blockchain-based In-Vitro fertilization (IVF) service application.

The project also includes collaboration with Vechain partner DNV — with the latter working with VeChain to provide supply chain governance along with product and digital assurance for the project.

Vechain, a supply-chain management and smart contract platform said in a post that MyBaby is the “first service” to combine third-party IVF data with blockchain technology:

“The cryptographically secured properties of blockchain technology create a secure and reliable environment and enhance the user experience in a way that is unprecedented in the IVF field.”

The MyBaby project aims to improve the IVF process by enabling families to transparently see all of the data associated with the development of eggs into embryos traced on blockchain.  VeChain believes the MyBaby app has the ability to ease anxiety, depression and stress associated with the IVF cycle.

As part of the MyBaby service, all information and data trails from the IVF process, including “imagery produced by medical tools to the delivery of the zygote itself” will be uploaded on the VeChainThor blockchain — with the information only accessible to authorized users of the MyBaby Application.

“MyBaby’s benefits are multifaceted, allowing users to view and track the extraction, labeling, and scoring of fertilized eggs as well as the cultivation and preservation of embryos,” the medium post read.

The project claims to provide additional security for sensitive and private medical data, by reducing the number of “intermediaries between production and delivery of data.”

This isn’t the first time Renji Hospital has moved to incorporate blockchain tech, back in 2019 it partnered with VeChain and DNV to launch the “world’s first” blockchain-based “Intelligent Tumor Treatment Center.”