3 reasons for modernizing healthcare IT

As hospitals and healthcare organizations continue adapting to digital demands, CIOs and other administrators are constantly looking for ways to deliver quality care through modern technologies. However, provider and patient data from a variety of sources is overwhelming healthcare information technology administrators, and cost pressures from above are causing IT buyers to rethink data management strategies. Therefore, finding the best way to reduce human interaction with sensitive data, and consequently human error, all while staying within budget, has become a top priority.

With improved technologies top of mind for all healthcare workers, below are three reasons why modernizing data management strategies can help ensure quality care comes first.

The cloud is better than a file cabinet
Many healthcare organizations are already in the cloud. However, the industry not quite at full adoption just yet. According to a recent HIMSS Analytics survey about cloud computing adoption in healthcare provider organizations, 83 percent of IT executives are using some sort of cloud services today. With this research in mind, it’s important to ensure that moving to the cloud delivers to healthcare CIOs expectations of cost and simplicity when it comes to data backup and archiving.  Leveraging cloud storage allows healthcare CIOs to reduce the costs and headaches of maintaining data center floor space, storage hardware implementation and maintenance and smooth out operational costs with a pay-as-you-go model.  Furthermore, properly storing the data further supports the model of ensuring quick, ready access to information to run healthcare operations 24/7.   

Minimized risk with a smaller paper trail
According to the same HIMSS Analytics survey, 61 percent of healthcare IT administrators said security is a major concern when it came to cloud technologies. CIOs and CISOs are working together to solve this problem as securing patient information goes hand-in-hand with patient care quality. Eliminating notebooks and pens and modernizing patient data into backup and archive solutions can ensure the data is reliably maintained, encrypted and easy to manage.

Further, when this data is living in encrypted places, CIOs can sleep easier at night knowing patient data is safe. This is extremely relevant when it comes to mobile devices. A recent Forrester report said only 59 percent of hospitals ensure mobile devices physicians are using on the job are encrypted. This low number increases the chance for data loss and reaffirms the need for security IT strategies.

Reduced costs through one platform
Because patient data is coming from all different departments and from various physicians at multiple office locations, managing the influx of data can be challenging. Advocate Healthcare, the Midwest’s largest health system serving 3.4 million patients annually, recently eliminated paper records and tape backup and brought all its patient data generated from multiple sources into one cloud-based portal. The benefits? Data management process became significantly more efficient and both time and resources were saved with a central portal.

Leading healthcare providers are well on their way to achieving complete implementation of modern data management strategies, but the industry still has room to grow.

Jay Savaiano is the director of worldwide healthcare business development at CommVault, a data management company that helps healthcare organizations implement modern data strategies. Savaiano and the CommVault team help healthcare organizations take a holistic approach to data management through backup, recovery and archiving to reduce costs and increase performance. 

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