Title: The Increasing Need for Healthcare IT Solutions
1The Increasing Need for Healthcare IT Solutions
2Healthcare IT Solutions
- Medical advances and new technologies require
healthcare IT solutions to keep pace. - Now more than ever, healthcare organizations
require a safe and secure environment, 100
guaranteed systems availability and compliance
with regulatory acts such as HIPPA. -
3Healthcare IT Solutions
- As medical advances in patient treatments emerge,
healthcare IT needs to keep pace. IT solutions
must deliver readily available and secure
electronic medical data, such as Electronic
Medical Records (EMRs) and Picture Archiving and
Communication Systems (PACS). Innovative
treatment options, like Telemedicine, require
reliable and robust IT infrastructures. - And the overall IT environment must comply with
stringent government regulations. -
- Now more than ever, healthcare organizations
require secure, reliable and compliant IT
solutions to deliver quality patient care. -
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4A Safe Healthcare IT Environment
- Compromised security can significantly interfere
with healthcares ability to care for patients.
Healthcare IT threats pop up everywhere. Computer
viruses, hackers, human error and disgruntled
employees can be a significant threat to mission
critical applications and patient data.
Therefore, rock-solid physical and network
security becomes a top priority for all data
center service providers. - SAS 70 Type II audited processes ensure a
providers operational procedures, security, and
controls are working effectively to safeguard and
protect your data and equipment. A safe and
secure healthcare IT network contributes to
quality patient care, enhanced productivity,
increased mobile point of care access to
information and reduced costs. - In addition, healthcare IT solutions require up
to five levels of physical and electronic systems
working 24/7 to protect your equipment. These
systems include around-the-clock monitored closed
circuit televisions, onsite support and security
teams, biometrics security systems and/or
military-grade key cards, and various alarms and
sensors tied to fire and police departments. -
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5Reliable Healthcare IT Solutions
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- With life or death decisions at stake, downtime
is not an option. Your medical and healthcare IT
infrastructure must guarantee 100 availability.
In addition to guaranteed uptime, service level
agreement should cover key elements and service
metrics like power, temperature and network
availability. -
- Healthcare IT solutions should eliminate any
worry about your critical healthcare IT
infrastructure experiencing issues or downtime.
Redundancy and reliability built into data center
operations, including critical power and cooling
infrastructure, can ensure fast, easy access to
patient information for your healthcare
personnel. -
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6Reliable Healthcare IT Solutions
- Healthcare providers must maintain uptime even in
the event of a disaster. Data center solutions
need to provide hospitals, physicians and other
healthcare providers with cost efficient disaster
recovery facilities, systems and infrastructure.
In addition, your critical data must be backed-up
and safe. -
- Finally, your healthcare business must adapt
quickly to changing technologies, regulatory
requirements and patient needs. Data center
solutions must provide scalable infrastructures
to easily address any changes in your operations.
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7The Challenges of Regulatory Compliance
- Healthcare providers are challenged with
conforming to legislation and guidelines that
govern the security and confidentiality of stored
information. The Health Insurance and
Portability Accountability Act (HIPAA) and the
Electronic Healthcare Network Accreditation
Commission (EHNAC) mandate the safeguarding of
Protected Health Information (PHI). Information
breaches can result in millions of dollars of
lost business, penalties and fines. -
- IT shares the responsibility for HIPAA protection
of all medical electronic records and patient
information. With the recent HIPAA enforcement
actions, its becoming increasingly important
that health care IT operates in a secure, audited
data center. -
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8The Challenges of Regulatory Compliance
- The HIPAA Security Rule applies to all health
plans, health care clearinghouses, and to any
health care provider who transmits health
information in electronic form. The following is
a more specific list of who needs to be HIPAA
compliant - Covered health care providers (hospitals,
clinics, regional health services, individual
medical practitioners) that carry out
transactions in electronic form - Health care clearinghouses
- Health plans (including insurers, HMOs, Medicaid,
Medicare prescription drug card sponsors,
flexible spending accounts, public health
authority, in addition to employers, schools or
universities that collect, store or transmit PHI,
or electronically protected health information,
to enroll employees or students in health plans) - Their business associates (including private
sector vendors and third-party administrators) -
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9The Challenges of Regulatory Compliance
Many healthcare organizations struggle with IT
issues related to security, reliability and
compliance. They strive to ensure their IT
infrastructure is able to support all of their
healthcare applications. Your healthcare IT
solution should combine extensive clinical best
practice knowledge with innovation, business
sense, technological expertise and a thorough
knowledge of the healthcare industry to help
optimize your patient services.
10About the Author
- Michael Duckett is President of CoreLink Data
Centers, a leading provider of data center
hosting and managed services solutions in
Chicago, Las Vegas, Phoenix and Seattle. For more
information about healthcare IT solutions, visit
http//www.corelink.com/medical-and-healthcare-it-
solutions.htm today. -
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