Implementing Web-based e-Health Portal Systems

As an emerging form of enabling technology, Web-based e-Health portals provide patients easier accesses to their healthcare information and services. We design and implement such an e-Health portal which can integrate many backend medical services effectively. A major challenge in designing such a system is to meet critical security requirements, such as the confidentiality of patient data, the integrity of diagnosis results, and the availability of healthcare services. In this thesis I address the issue from the access control perspective. More specifically, I first propose a two-tier approach to access control for e-Health portals. The approach supplements existing Role Based Access Control (RBAC) capabilities with a rule-based access control module based on the classical Flexible Authorization Framework (FAF) model. I study conflict resolution and interaction between the two modules. I also address authentication for real-time services provided by remote service providers.