Innovation cannot exist without security, especially in healthcare. Recently, I had the opportunity to speak with several experts at HIMSS 2019 about what best practices healthcare providers should consider when it comes to the security of patient information.
“Securing patient data is one of the most important things that every hospital needs to do,” said David Chou, vice president of Constellation Research. “[Hospitals should] focus on the transmission of the data, and making sure the transmission is secure.”
Britney Treadaway, vice president of strategy and corporate development at IDEAL LIFE, Inc., recommended that organizations carefully review workflows and applications to avoid data transfers carrying any personally identifiable health information. That way, whenever data is sent from a device to the electronic health record, it never includes sensitive information that can be associated with a patient.
According to digital health influencer Evan Kirstel, it’s important that hospitals not look at security as a problem exclusively for the IT department or the chief security officer. In his words: “Security is really everyone’s problem.”
“It’s all of our responsibility,” agreed Ammad Khan, CEO of IrisVision. “At each layer, at each touch point, we have to follow the best practices that allow us to serve the patients to the best extent possible.”
These best practices must also include making sure that whatever you are doing is HIPAA-compliant, said Will O’Connor, chief medical information officer at TigerConnect. O’Connor recommends using a common security framework to protect not only the applications your hospital uses, but also any other applications your application will interface with.
Learn how Samsung Knox provides a secure platform for healthcare providers to pursue digital transformation.
