Exploring the Future of Healthcare: Workshop on Blockchain-Based Patient Record Linkage System at North South University

In a groundbreaking initiative towards revolutionizing healthcare systems, North South University hosted a workshop on “Blockchain-Based Patient Record Linkage System,” the research project funded by the ICT Division, Govt. of Bangladesh, on January 24, 2024. The event aimed to shed light on the potential of blockchain technology in the healthcare sector in Bangladesh.

The workshop commenced with an insightful presentation by Professor Dr. Abu Sayed Md. Latiful Hoque, Head of eSRD-Lab at BUET and Visiting Professor at North South University. Dr. Hoque provided a comprehensive overview of the project and delved into the intricacies of blockchain development, showcasing its potential to transform patient record management.

Bipul Chandra Dev Nath, a distinguished developer from 3dots Service Systems, took the stage to discuss the development of blockchain mobile applications using Flutter. Nath's presentation highlighted the practical aspects of implementing blockchain in mobile technology, offering a glimpse into the future of healthcare applications.

Sajid Abdullah, a blockchain developer and founder of 3dots Service Systems, took the audience on a journey through smart contract development. Covering essential topics such as Metamask, Remix, Solidity Basics, Deployment, and Testing, Abdullah's presentation offered valuable insights into the technical aspects of blockchain implementation.

Professor Dr. Rajesh Palit, Chairman of the ECE Department at North South University, graced the workshop with his presence. As a special guest, Dr. Palit emphasized the importance of integrating innovative technologies like blockchain into healthcare systems for enhanced efficiency and security.

As a fitting conclusion to the event, certificates were distributed to the participants at the end of the workshop. The certificates recognized the attendee's active participation and commitment to exploring the cutting-edge applications of blockchain in healthcare. 

The workshop was organized by eSRD-Lab, BUET, in association with 3dots Service System and hosted by M Tanvir Rahman, Research Assistant at eSRD-Lab, BUET. 

Workshop on Blockchain-Based Patient Record Linkage System at North South University marked a significant step forward in the convergence of healthcare and blockchain technology in Bangladesh. The insights shared by the distinguished speakers and the active participation of the audience underscored the growing importance of blockchain in shaping the future of patient record management.

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A journal paper from eSRD-Lab, CSE, BUET titled 'A privacy-preserving National Clinical Data Warehouse: Architecture and analysis,' Volume 23, March 2022, 100238, received the Elsevier Smart Health Journal Best Paper Award 2022. The paper's authors are Md Raihan Mia, Dr. Abu Sayed Md Latiful Hoque, Dr. Shahidul Islam Khan, and Dr. Sheikh Iqbal Ahamed. A prototype model of the National Clinical Data Warehouse (NCDW) of Bangladesh has been proposed in this paper as a proof of concept. This research project is aimed to provide a privacy-preserved anonymous clinical data platform for researchers, analysts, medical practitioners, health care providers, and other beneficiaries by integrating the clinical data from heterogeneous sources of different public and private hospitals/diagnostic centers in Bangladesh. HIPAA guidelines and health data standardization (e.g., ICD-11, SNOMED CT) techniques have been followed to ensure interoperability and privacy preservation. The importance of the NCDW is diverse and can be used for predicting health risks and outcomes, analyzing health status from different perspectives (e.g., disease, geography, age, time series), generating reports, and sharing data with healthcare providers/organizations to improve health care services.

This project was conducted at eSRD-Lab by establishing an academia-industry research collaboration among three academic entities: 1) eSRD-Lab, Department of CSE, BUET 2) Institute of Information and Communication Technology (IICT), BUET 3) Ubicomp Lab, Department of Computer Science, Marquette University, USA and two software companies: 1) MySoft Ltd, Bangladesh and 2) Ubitrix Inc, WI, USA.

Every year about 13 lakh students participate in the HSC examination. But HSC ICT programming skills are still far from the desired target due to the lack of skilled teachers and inadequate labs etc. This deficiency has an impact after admission to university.

In order to make programming easier after coming to BUET, HSC ICT C Programming Virtual Class was initiated using HSC ICT Online System (https://hscict.org/) for freshers of 2022 batch of BUET by utilizing the time before classes start. For that purpose, the virtual class was held from 17th August to 3rd September 2023. Honorable Vice-Chancellor of BUET Dr. Satya Prasad Majumdar provided overall support for the implementation of the initiative. Virtual classes were conducted by teachers of the CSE department of BUET. The closing and certificate announcement ceremony of the said virtual class was held on Sunday 10th September at 7:30 pm on the Zoom platform.

Honorable Vice-Chancellor of BUET, Prof. Dr. Satya Prasad Majumder sir was present as the Chief Guest. Honorable Vice-Chancellor of RUET Professor Dr. Md. Jahangir Alam was the special guest. BUET Computer Science and Engineering Department Head Professor Dr. Mahmuda Nazneen attended the event as an honored guest. The event was presided over by Professor Dr. Muhammad Anisuzzaman Talukdar, Director of RISE,BUET.

Ferdous Raihan, of the 2022 batch of Civil Engineering Department, said, “This course was very beneficial for me. All the problems and limitations I had with C programming are gone.”

Zeenat Mahal Papia, from the 2022 batch of Industrial Production Engineering Department said, “I did not have much knowledge of C programming. I was afraid. After this course I can now say so much about C programming that I have no more fear.”

Naveed Bin Hasan, one of the teachers conducting the class, said, “This is the second time I have taken the HSC ICTC programming class. I can happily say both times my experience was excellent. Students did the classes with great pleasure. I am extremely happy with their participation and performance.”

The honored guest of the program Professor Dr. Mahmuda Nazneen Ma'am said, “Programming is now like basic science in the current 4th IR era. This knowledge is important for everyone now. Our initiative has introduced the basic concepts and practices of programming at the very beginning of the course. HSC ICT online platform is well organized and developed in the light of experience. It is very helpful in that regard.”

Also present as a special guest in the event, Honorable Vice-Chancellor Professor Dr. Md. Jahangir Alam. At one point of expression, he said, "If we want to bring Industrial Revolution 4 in our hands properly, then we have no choice but to learn programming." It's a big achievement that you learned programming fundamentals before class even started.”

The chief guest of the program, Honorable Vice-Chancellor of BUET, Prof. Dr. Satya Prasad Majumder said, "If smart Bangladesh is to be created through industrial revolution, smart citizens will be needed. For which smart graduates will be required. Everyone should learn everything the smart way. You have to develop your talent. I hope that the initiative we have taken today will be extended everywhere.”

1147 students actively participated in this two week long course. A total of 512 students achieved A+ by solving 80% or more of the given programming problems in the system. The total number of programs run by them is more than 21 thousand. Analyzing the data of the students at the end of the course, it can be seen that 88.5% of the participating students have improved their programming knowledge. 93% of students have increased confidence in programming and almost 100% of students recognize the course as suitable for HSC students.

With the help of ICT Division's Innovation Grant, the HSC ICT Online System developed at eSRD-Lab can be said to be a practical solution to many of the prominent problems in ICT education across the country. Due to the convenience of all programming through smartphones, it will be possible to eliminate the current disparity in the field of programming education for the students of remote areas of the country. It is expected that if all concerned come forward for the widespread use of the HSC ICT Online System, it can play a major role in the development of national ICT education.

Last Sunday, 18th June, the certificate distribution ceremony was held at the IAC seminar room of the CSE Department of BUET for the students who completed the 1st Virtual Industrial Training Program for Level-4, Term-1 Commencement students of the CSE Department of BUET.

Honorable Vice-Chancellor of BUET Prof. Dr. Satya Prasad Majumder was present as the chief guest at the event, BUET Honorable Vice-Chancellor Prof. Dr. was present as a special guest. Abdul Jabbar Khan. Professor Dr. was present as a guest. Muhammad Anisuzzaman Talukder, Director, Rise, Buet. Indra Mohan Sutradhar, Head & General Manager, Software Development Division, Pubali Bank Limited and Mohammad Sirajul Islam, CEO, Era Infotech Limited were present as guests on behalf of industry/organization. The chief supervisor of this industrial training was Professor of CSE Department of BUET Dr. Abu Saeed Mohammad Latiful Haque, Dr. Sadia Sharmin and Professor Dr. Sohrab Hossain and Dr. Muhammad Ali Naeem. Head of CSE department was present as the president of the program. Mahmuda Nazneen.

Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology is taking various steps to improve the quality of education in order to improve the quality of national education and global ranking.

In continuation of this, the professor of CSC department. Abu Saeed Mohammad Latiful Haque initiated the 1st Virtual Industrial Training Program to provide hands-on industrial experience to Level-4, Term-1 commencing students of CSE Department of BUET. Dr. The training program is conducted using Hawk's innovative platform Virtual Internship System (vinternship.org). A total of 99 students, 6 teachers of BUET CSC department and 12 industry mentors participated in this virtual industrial training program from May 15 to June 12.

A total of six industrial trucks completed the training program. The tracks are:

1. Full Stack Development – The industry partner for this truck was MySoft Ltd

2. IoT Software Development – The industry partner for this truck was Red Dot Digital IT Ltd

3. Mobile Systems and Software Development - Pubali Bank Limited was the industry partner for this truck.

4. Health Data Analytics – The industry partner for this truck was Mysoft Limited.

5. Business Data Analytics - Era Infotech Limited was the partner for this truck.

6. Machine Learning – The industry partner for this truck was North-West Power Generation Company Limited.

The main supervisor of the program. Dr Haque said:

“In just two days after we got the approval, the students joined the preparation and successfully completed the training program and among them 83 are getting their certificates today.”

Iftekhar I Mahbub Zion, a student participating in the training program, said,

“If I can say about this one month training program in one sentence it is to say that it was very effective for the students of our CSE department. Especially when we visited the industry where we got to know how a team works. The study we do in class is mostly theory. When we went to MySoft, they basically work with hospitals, so in practical life, how they develop and maintain their system, we got to know these things which we can't really learn from the class.”

Sirajur Rahman, CEO of Era Infotech, who was the special guest of the event on behalf of the industry, said:

“Virtual internship training and virtual learning are the need of the hour. Because now physical communication has become very tough. We had 20 students registered with us. Why 20, many more students could have been registered through the virtual platform. Because (physically) accommodating so many students is very tough especially for IT industry. Because the IT industries of Bangladesh are struggling to survive.”

Another guest at the event, Indra Mohan Sutradhar, Head of Software Development Division and General Manager, Pubali Bank Limited said:

“We are proud to work with Buet. We gave your students a real application development task. Our mobile bank application is made by us. We have decided that Buet will work with us to build the fund management module. Honestly speaking we built the product with them. And want to let you know that we will bring this product live very soon.”

The chief guest of the program, Honorable Vice-Chancellor of BUET, Dr. Satya Prasad Majumder addressed the students:

“You guys need to speed up. Now is not the time to walk, now is the time to run. You have to train by running, otherwise the technology will be missed.”

The president of the program is the head of the CSE department. Mahmuda Nazneen says,

“There is no substitute for internships ie partnerships between academia and industry. It is a globally recognized relationship. We apply theory and then do lab projects but actually completeness does not come in it. We prepare them for the industry but still some gap remains. So that place is filled by internship or training.”

The program was concluded by thanking everyone.

Dhaka 12 May 2023  - The esrdLab successfully concluded a workshop on Industrial Technology Track Development held at IAC BUET on 12 May 2023. The event was attended by industry experts, researchers, and academics from various organizations.

The workshop aimed to provide insights into the latest trends and developments in Industrial Technology, including the latest tools, techniques, and technologies being used in industry. The event provided a platform named vInternship for participants to exchange ideas, share their experiences, and discuss the latest research in the field. From the workshop, a pathway has been identified to train BUET students for the latest industry trends. The workshop produced new ideas as well as some solutions that will effectively be incorporated into the upcoming training program.

The technical sessions provided participants with an opportunity to share hands-on experience with the latest tools and technologies in the field. The sessions covered a range of topics, including machine learning, data analysis, and process optimization.

The panel discussions provided an opportunity for participants to engage in discussions with industry experts and researchers. The discussions covered a range of topics, including the challenges facing the industry, the latest trends, and the future of Industrial Technology.

At the end of the workshop, the participants expressed their satisfaction with the quality of the content and the organization of the event. The organizers also expressed their gratitude to the participants and speakers for their contribution to the success of the workshop.

Overall, the workshop was a great success, providing participants with valuable insights and knowledge that they can apply in their work on the upcoming training program.

"Programming, which is a fear for our young students, you have tried to alleviate that fear by intervening in your education at the very beginning" - Prof. Dr. Hafiz Md Hasan Babu, Dean, University of Dhaka

Every year about 13 lakh students participate in the HSC examination. Although ICT has been made a compulsory subject for all departments since 2014, HSC ICT programming skills are still far from the desired target due to the constraints of lack of skilled teachers, inadequate labs etc. This deficiency has to be compensated after admission to honors level. Programming is a scary subject for most of the students as along with engineering subjects, almost every other subject now includes C Programming. Buet is no exception.

Therefore, to make programming easier for new students of BUET after coming to BUET, Prof. Dr. Abu Sayed Mohammad Latiful Haque of CSE Department of BUET took the initiative of taking HSC ICT C Programming Virtual Class using the HSC ICT Online System developed as a research project in his eSRD-Lab.

According to him, C programming virtual class for freshers of BUET was conducted last October-November before the start of first year classes of BUET. The classes were conducted by the teachers of the CSE department of BUET. The classes were directly using the system developed by Dr. Latiful Haque without using any lecture sheets or PowerPoint. In this system, as the students write and save the programming code, the teacher can see the code written by the students from his dashboard and evaluate it. The special feature of this system is that students can do all the programming work through smartphones. System statistics show that more than 65% of students completed programming by participating in its virtual classes through smartphones.

998 students of BUET participated in this program which lasted for about a month and they wrote more than 20 thousand unique programs. These programs were run more than 95,000 times in total. The initiative has received positive response from both teachers and students. An Email sent to the CSE department teachers, after the commencement of the Undergraduate C Programming class of the fresh students of BUET, by Raihan Rashid, a teacher from the CSE department who conducted the virtual class:

“I must thank the HSC-ICT + your research team to provide a good ground for the students to learn the basics of programming before beginning their undergraduate studies. In our last intake of students (Batch 20), the performance of both CSE102, and CSE110 were very poor. However, in this semester, as far as  I can see, the students (Batch 21) seem very proactive in sessional classes. And everyone seems to have a better grasp over practice, online problems —making our job a little bit easy.

Overall, the HSC-ICT was a well-built system and the course was well executed. hscict.org is a motivating example for the department, I believe. "

A survey of students participating in virtual classes revealed that, 85% of the students said that their programming knowledge was enhanced by these classes. 87% of students said that they are now confident about C programming and 89% of students commented that if they had access to it at HSC level, it would have been very helpful.

Also, a certificate award virtual ceremony was held on 28th November 2022 for the distribution of certificates among the students who solved 80% of the problems in the class in which the honorable pro-vice-chancellor of BUET Prof. Dr. Abdul Jabbar Khan and were present as the chief guest. Professor Dr. Hafiz Md Hasan Babu, Dean, Faculty of Engineering and Technology, Dhaka University, and Prof. Dr. Muhammad Anisuzzaman Talukder, Director, RISE, Buet were present as special guests. Head of the CSE department  Dr. Mahmuda Nazneen was present as the president of the program.

The inventor of the HSC ICT online system and the initiator of virtual class, Professor of CSE department Dr Abu Sayed Mohammad Latiful Haque said about the background of the program,

“A survey of BUET CSE 2020 batch students showed that more than 81% students had average or below average C programming knowledge at HSC level. As a result, C programming course seemed difficult to them. Almost 90% of their students recommended that freshers should practice HSC Level C programming before starting BUET classes. Based on the survey, this program has been made to facilitate the learning of C Programming in the fresher 21st batch of students, so that the free time of the students can be spent on learning C programming before the start of classes to fill the HSC level programming deficiency.”

In the event, the opinions of the students participating in the virtual classes were taken.

CSE department student Shatabdi Dutta Chowdhury said,

“This platform has benefited me a lot…I need C programming a lot as I am a CSE major. I have not practiced this subject much at HSC level. So I thank all the teachers for giving me such an opportunity.”

  Ferdous Rahman Tanveer, a student of Mechanical Engineering said,

“Since we are 21st batch and we have given exam on short syllabus, we did not have ICT exam. So even after studying ICT, no practice was done. In this situation the BUET authorities took an initiative to make us practice HSC ICT C programming. This basic course is definitely highly praiseworthy. Through this program, we were able to practice and learn all the things that we had completely forgotten. Our course was very interesting. Especially when we ran each program we got some points. I even got up to 500 marks in one program. So it was very fun. So I really enjoyed the program, writing and running each program.”

The special guest of the program, Dr. Md. Anisuzzaman Talukdar said,

“The program that he (Dr. Abu Sayed Mohammad Latiful Haque) conducted, we learned from our students that, because the students did not take the ICT exam due to the Covid situation, it can be assumed that they did not do the ICT studies that they needed to do. Then it is clear how important this program was. … otherwise their programming would have remained a major deficiency. The snapshots we saw of the virtual classes show how interactive and innovative the class was. The students got a chance to dive into the program and do the work. As one student said, it was fun. They learnt a difficult subject like C programming while laughing and playing.”

Another special guest of the program is Professor Dr. Hafiz Md Hasan Babu said,

“The subject of programming has now become a very important matter for every subject. In our Dhaka University, those who study Bengali are also taught C programming, those who study history are also taught. I saw that Bangladesh Engineering University has created a beautiful environment and interactive classes. Programming is a fear for our young students, a fear you have tried to alleviate early on by intervening in your curriculum. It is very promising and I think every university should take the initiative that BUET has taken. Today, the students from the rural villages are facing problems in the field of programming when they come to the university level and we ourselves have seen that the life of many boys and girls becomes hell after the programming starts after admission in our CSE. In that case, such an educational program should be adopted by every university. From here I am very encouraged.”

The chief guest of the program, Prof. Dr. Abdul Jabbar Khan said,

“They did a great job. Through these virtual classes, this system is proven once again. We know that to build any platform, especially digital platform, it needs repeated testing. This platform was already proven, you are training the trainers. Now that this HSC ICT online system is directly used for our BUET students, the acceptance of the system has increased a lot. I want to take advantage of this situation now. We have given a letter to the Ministry of Education on how to spread it across Bangladesh. We will take this issue to other concerned ministries as soon as possible. Hon'ble Education Minister is very close to us, I am sure she will take such matters very positively."

Chair of the program Professor Dr. Mahmuda Nazneen says,

“Programming knowledge is essential in every sector now, especially when it comes to automation. Now the subject has become an important subject like basic science which we have to imbibe. And if you get such a platform, the fear of programming will be removed to a large extent. Many times practice facilities are not available. After running the program in this system, the result is shown immediately. When I was a student myself, I found it very difficult to bridge this gap. "

The program concluded by thanking everyone.

HSC ICT Online System is a practical solution to many glaring problems in ICT education across the country. Dr. Latiful Haque said that his cloud-based system is fully capable of being widely used in all higher-secondary level educational institutions across the country. Due to the convenience of all programming through smartphones, the current disparity in the field of programming education will be removed for the students of the remote areas of the country.

On the 22nd of October 2022, Dr. ASM Latiful Hoque and Kamruzzaman Shuvo from eSRD-Lab visited IIUC for academic collaboration between eSRD-Lab, BUET and Dept. of CSE, IIUC. 

Dr, Hoque gave a presentation on his two systems: Virtual Internship System(VIS) and HSC ICT Online, in the Auditorium room of IIUC. Faculty members and students from different departments were present.

The Special Guest was Prof. Dr. Mohammad Kumayun Kabir and

Chief Guest was Prof. Dr. Shahadat Hossain. The presentation was chaired by Dr. Mohammad Aman Ullah.

After the presentation a meeting between the two parties was held discussing various aspects of collaboration on the two projects.A Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between IIUC Data Science Research Group(IDSRG)  and eSystem Research & Development Lab, BUET(eSRD-Lab) was also signed. This MoU will enable cooperation between IDSRG and eSRD-Lab for mutually beneficial collaboration towards Joint Research and Knowledge Sharing, Capacity Building and Project/ Program Implementation.

During the MoU signing, Dr. Abu Syed Md. Latiful Haque (Professor, Dept. of CSE, BUET), Head of eSRD-Lab was present on behalf of eSRD-Lab and Dr. Shahidul Islam Khan, Founder Head of IDSRG was present on behalf of IDSRG.IDSRG give Dr. Hoque a crest of thanks. 

The fifth round of Virtual internships using The Virtual Internship System (VIS) was successfully completed on the 13th of November 2022. The closure was composed of a 7-hour long hackathon and project presentation. 15 interns from different public and private universities successfully completed their internships on four tracks: Cyber Security, Full Stack Development, Health Data Analytics and ASP.net.

The Academia-Industry Collaboration and Certificate Award Ceremony of 4th Round of Virtual Internship Program by MySoft Limited and eSRD Lab, CSE, BUET was held at IICT, ECE Building, BUET on June 13, 2022. Prof. Dr. Satya Prasad Majumder, Honorable Vice Chancellor, Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) inaugurated the program as the chief guest while Prof. Dr. Qumrul Ahsan, Honorable Vice Chancellor, University of Asia Pacific and Mr. AKM Ahmedul Islam Babu, Director, BASIS, was present as the special guest.

The program was chaired by Dr. Mahmuda Naznin, Head of CSE department, BUET. Eminent Academicians, Respected Teachers, Esteemed Industry Leaders, and other Distinguished Guests were also present in the program.

MySoft Limited, the leading healthcare software provider in Bangladesh, always believe in strengthening the bridge between the Academia-Industry collaboration. Frequent collaboration between academia and industry is a hallmark of the knowledge economy. Therefore, the eSystems Research & Development (eSRD-Lab) Lab, Dept. of CSE, BUET has successfully designed, developed and completed the 4th round of “Virtual Internship System” Program in collaboration with MySoft Limited. Mr. Manjurul Hoque, Managing Director, MySoft Limited said that, “I am pleased to be part of the vinternship system developed by eSRD lab department of CSE BUET.

My company has been working closely with eSRD Lab to make a true virtual internship environment that will be beneficial for the interns and industry alike. I believe it will strengthen the bridge between academia and industry. Over the past two years, MySoft Limited has been providing development tracks for the virtual internship platform.

Now the 4th batch of internships has been completed successfully. “I am delighted to inform you that I have identified several excellent developers and programmers from those batches.” Said Mr. Manjurul. Mr. Manjurul always believes that this platform would be extremely beneficial to the industry since it would allow more interns to have a realistic understanding of the software industry’s working environment. MySoft Limited expects to be a long-term partner of eSRD Lab in the platform.

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After successfully completed the 1st batch of internship from NSU graduating/graduated students, Virtual Internship System started new journey of one month long virtual internship program only for CSE, BUET graduating/graduated students. More than 60+ interns have enrolled in the 2nd batch of internship and continuing thier 1st job experience with eSRD-Lab VIS-platform. In this internship, eSRD-Lab collaborate with two new leading software company, REVE Systems and Durbin Labs to bring a industry environment into the system.

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