New Feature: Smart Card functionality

fcarlier · Post by **fcarlier** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 5:27 am

I'd like to propose a new feature for Open Dental: Smart Card functionality.

Nowadays, many cards (like social security cards, identity cards or credit cards), contain a chip. The data on these so-called smart cards can be used to identify people.

Especially, the usage of electronic identity cards and social security cards could be integrated into Open Dental to:
1. Automatically recognize any patient: you would insert the card into the card reader, and Open Dental would offer to open the patient
2. Automatically add new patients: just copy the relevant data (name, address, social security data) into the computer
3. Automatically update the data: should the data change in a significant way, Open Dental could offer to automatically update the data.

Even more, electronic identity cards can be used to digitally sign documents -- they could be an alternative to the Topaz signatures.

I'd like add Smart Card functionality to Open Dental. The implementation details would be (roughly):

1. Smart Card back-end (one for Windows, one for Linux): raises an event when a new card is inserted, or when a card is removed.
2. Smart Card Service: A specific implementation for each type of smart card. These copy the data off the smart card onto a Patient object
3. Smart Card Monitor: if a new smart card is detected, it invokes the Smart Card service to read the data off the smart card and allows the user to read the data on the smart card.

I currently have a small, but working "proof-of-concept" program running.

What do you think? Would this be a valuable addition to Open Dental?

jkeele · Post by **jkeele** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 8:53 am

Hi,
I think this is a great feature. I know there is a company here in Switzerland working on this now. Do you have any providers scoped out for making an identity card from scratch? If so, let me know and I will research them as well.
See ya
James

fcarlier · Post by **fcarlier** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 9:03 am

Hi,

I don't personally have a smart card that I created myself. We (almost all Belgians) have two smart cards issued by the government: the social security card and the identity card.

It, however, is possible to create your own smart cards (that you could give to your patients, for example): http://www.google.be/search?q=smart+card+manufacturer .

Hope that helps

drtech · Post by **drtech** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 10:38 am

certainly think it will be useful in the future. How many people actually use them now I don't know, but it would be great to keep OD ahead of other programs...1st for smart card integration!

Post by **jordansparks** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 1:40 pm

As Dr Fuchs implied, Americans simply don't use smart cards. About the closest we come is a chip in some credit cards to allow use by proximity rather than by swiping. But smart cards... no. It's because we Americans tend to value privacy more than convenience, so the Government has a hard time convincing us that smart cards would be worth it. But I think it will happen one of these days. It's up to you if you want to do it. For now, it will only be useful outside the US.

fcarlier · Post by **fcarlier** » Sat Sep 01, 2007 2:40 am

Any card with a chip on it is basically a smart card

. And since our ID cards or social security cards don't have much more information on them than you would have to hand out previously, there aren't too many privacy concerns. Especially because there are quite strict rules on what people can do with your data.

As for credit cards, I remember that I could use mine once to identify myself when I was collecting my plane ticket in the US. So you may have an integration possibility there (although I'm not sure people are always very happy on handing out their credit cards).

Because there are quite some contries that have electronic ID's now (see here for a list: http://www.opensc-project.org/opensc/wiki/), you can expect this functionality to be implemented (or of value) in many "localized" versions of Open Dental. That makes me believe it may be worth implementing a basic framework in Open Dental. Expect it in about a month.