There are a lot of things vying for your attention each day:
- Learning how AI will impact your business.
- Integrating the newest technology into your offices.
- Automating workflow for a more efficient office environment.
- Staying up with the latest trends in the field.
Oh, and trying to improve the patient experience as well.
That’s a lot for anyone to take on. The smaller your practice, the more frantic everything becomes. It’s easy to let some things fall to the wayside, especially things you might not understand.
That’s also what leaves you vulnerable.
You can’t be in business today and not have integrated electronic health records (EHRs) into your business. But how high up on the list is EHR security? Are you keeping up with the latest trends? Do you know the best ways to keep your information secure?
Or are you sitting, waiting, hoping it doesn’t all fall apart?
Why should you care?
It’s the law
The biggest reason to pay attention to securing your EHR data is because it’s the law. HIPAA requires you to secure your patient data and mandates things like employee training, data encryption, firewall implementation, and more. What it doesn’t give you is a lot of the specifics for the step by step processes. One of the easiest ways to ensure you’re always in compliance is to have a trusted IT security team on your side. They can worry about keeping your data secure while you spend your time doing what you do best.
Data breaches aren’t going away
It will always be a cat and mouse game between those who want to keep information safe, and those who want to find a way in. Right now, in 2019, millions of patient files have been compromised across the US. Healthcare data breaches have been on the rise this year. What that means is that hackers are finding more ways to get in behind the first line of defense. It also means we have to be more prudent in ensuring we’re doing all we can to protect patient records.
Other factors impact security
What’s your biggest threat to compromising EHR data? Hackers trying to get in? Or maybe it’s the weather. What happens when the utility company shuts down the power to try and prevent wildfires? What happens if a fire ravages your community? Or a hurricane floods your city for days? Sometimes your biggest threat is beyond your control. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration recently listed the last three years as historic in terms of the number and cost of national disasters. Your best course of action is to move to a cloud-based system because data storage off site can be accessed from anywhere in the event your devices are lost or compromised.
When your patients come to you, it’s for a specific reason. Focus on that, not your security. When you partner with an IT team that understands the threats and works hard to keep your data safe, you can focus on what you do best.
For IT Strategy, Cloud Conversion, or Help Desk Services reach out to us at Silver Linings Technology 360-450-4759.
