March 2, 2023 | By Greg Dougherty
Accessing essential healthcare information is of the utmost importance during a data breach, ransomware attack, and especially a natural disaster. These disasters are unavoidable, but preparedness keeps it possible for clinicians to access the data they need to treat patients.
Every healthcare institution is at risk of a debilitating security event. Preparedness begins with a solid data backup, a data recovery solution, and well-laid contingency plans. In the face of any number of disasters, a data recovery solution means the difference between administering care and treatment or being brought to a standstill.
These are the top benefits of cloud services, backup, and disaster recovery for the healthcare industry.
Benefits of Direct Cloud Access for Healthcare Organizations
Cost Efficiency
Due to the intricacies of setting up a solid cloud backup and disaster recovery strategy, you’re likely to bet that this setup is costly when you go it alone. However, cost-effectiveness is one of the key benefits clients note when adopting cloud backups in the healthcare industry through a cloud service provider.
A hybrid cloud strategy is preferred by healthcare for two reasons: It provides increased flexibility and control over data. This increased flexibility allows for better use of resources, which equates to a more efficient budget.
Data security and privacy are crucial in the healthcare industry, and control over that data is an essential component of that confidentiality. Hybrid cloud provides an added layer of security by keeping data encrypted both in transit and at rest. This is vital for ensuring that protected information remains confidential and secure. Furthermore, operating in the cloud will save you money versus maintaining your own hardware, which you’ll likely replace multiple times over.
Manageability and Reliability
Healthcare operations are complex, with multiple moving facets. The manageability and reliability of that infrastructure is a crucial benefit, not to mention one of the primary requirements for medical cloud computing.
In a hybrid cloud configuration, each responsibility is executed by independent compartments. For example, when ordering multiple tests for the same patient, each request will be carried out separately from the rest. The workload of one component doesn’t affect the workload of another component, no matter how many resources it requires.
At the same time, no matter how many components are active at once, the exchange between the system module is closely monitored for security and compliance against cyberthreat and additional disruptions. With the pipeline clearly defined by these compartments, it’s easier to oversee the operation as a whole, analyze its effectiveness, and consistently adjust for optimization.
Private, Secure, and Compliant
We live in an age of digital transformation. Unfortunately, with that ever-present transformation comes ever-present cyber threats. Hackers target healthcare because patient medical information is more valuable than financial and personal data. Maintaining patient privacy is your top priority, and the same should be true for your IT infrastructure.
Cloud computing allows for the highest level of HIPAA-compliant security by offering a combination of public and private cloud servers (hybrid cloud). Your sensitive and confidential information is stored on the private servers under secure access while public servers execute the operational data. This configuration enables insight into who is using sensitive data and where — directly placing the control of your patient data back in your hands.
Opti9 takes full ownership and responsibility of the infrastructure stack for web-facing applications and healthcare SaaS platforms. Our technical experts proactively monitor and manage your entire environment, including OS, application management, load balancing, firewall, server patches, database redundancy/replication, etc.
Data access, backup, and recovery are essential parts of any healthcare organization’s security strategy. From a lost file to a daunting data deletion event, your backup provider should be there to support you through the data recovery process when you need to recover fast.
You deserve an experienced cloud backup provider that will be there to not only provide solid, consistent backups but simple, seamless recovery. Contact Opti9 to protect your data today. Schedule your free consultation here.