HealthChain: A Hybrid Blockchain for Scalable and Secure Healthcare Data Management

Ahmad Mousa Altamimi; Lamia Al-Kershi; Qusay Abdo

doi:10.48084/etasr.17941

Authors

Ahmad Mousa Altamimi Princess Sumaya University for Technology, Amman, Jordan
Lamia Al-Kershi Princess Sumaya University for Technology, Amman, Jordan
Qusay Abdo Princess Sumaya University for Technology, Amman, Jordan

Volume: 16 | Issue: 3 | Pages: 36438-36446 | June 2026 | https://doi.org/10.48084/etasr.17941

Received: 3 February 2026 | Revised: 21 February 2026 and 13 March 2026 | Accepted: 15 March 2026 | Online: 13 May 2026

Corresponding author: Ahmad Mousa Altamimi

Abstract

Blockchain technology has emerged as a promising foundation for secure, transparent, and patient-centric healthcare data management; however, the scalability, latency, and data storage limitations of conventional blockchains hinder their adoption in data-intensive healthcare environments involving Electronic Health Records (EHRs), medical imaging, and continuous sensor data streams. To address these limitations, sidechain architectures have been proposed as a viable solution, enabling off-chain processing and storage while maintaining cryptographic anchoring to a secure main blockchain. In this context, the paper introduces HealthChain, a formally specified sidechain-based architecture for scalable, privacy-preserving healthcare data management. Unlike prior work that remains largely conceptual, HealthChain provides an explicit definition of system components, cross-chain interaction mechanisms, data management policies, and governance responsibilities. Furthermore, the proposed architecture separates governance and auditability functions, maintained on a permissioned main blockchain, from high-throughput healthcare data processing, delegated to domain-specific sidechains. This design enables efficient handling of large-scale healthcare data while preserving security and compliance requirements. The proposed model is evaluated using blockchain-relevant performance metrics, including transaction throughput, latency, storage overhead, and cross-chain communication cost. Comparative analysis demonstrates that HealthChain significantly improves scalability and efficiency over a traditional main-chain-only approach, while preserving decentralization, data integrity, and regulatory compliance. Overall, the results highlight the potential of sidechain-based architectures to enable practical, large-scale deployment of blockchain technologies in healthcare systems.

Keywords:

blockchain, sidechains, healthcare data management, scalability, privacy, interoperability

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