Future Healthcare Today curates the latest news and trends in the health IT industry. In this week’s news roundup, we look at how healthcare providers have embraced the cloud and the impact that it’s having on patient outcomes. Read the latest in health IT news:
Pro Tips: Security Considerations For Managing Hybrid Cloud Infrastructure
Healthcare IT News spoke with Winston Armstrong, CISO at the San Diego Super Computer Center, and Sandeep Chandra, director of health cyberinfrastructure at the same center, about the Center’s use of hybrid cloud and its benefits. As Chandra notes, the buzz around cloud has grown recently, because it is a neutral standard that people can relate to. The Center, he noted, wanted to explore the benefits – from scale and automation to cost savings – that come with a cloud implementation. They partnered with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to buildout existing on-prem capabilities into the cloud using the company’s cloud formation templates that allow the Center to create a template and spin up multiple different use cases in the cloud. This saves them time to deployment. Watch the video with Armstrong and Chandra here.
How The Cloud Is Transforming Healthcare
Cloud computing is changing the way healthcare providers — doctors, clinics and hospitals — deliver quality, affordable services to their patients. This transition is being driven by two forces: the business imperative to cut costs and improve the quality of care. On the business side, providers are continually tasked to reduce their operational expenses while they struggle to contain rising infrastructure, administrative and pharmaceutical costs. At the same time, they face stringent government demands to improve the quality of healthcare and provide common standards in the industry. On the patient side, providers must satisfy the demand for instant, top-quality access to healthcare services. Patients — who are accustomed to the 24/7 availability and service from online retailers and financial institutions — expect and even demand such access and services from their healthcare providers. Read the article in Forbes here.
Healthcare Finally Embracing Cloud in Real Numbers
The healthcare industry finally has embraced cloud computing, according to a recent survey of Members of the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives. The survey focused on cloud storage, positing that it can provide healthcare all the benefits that it has provided virtually every other vertical market: cost savings, improved access to data, enhanced collaboration, and increased security for smaller providers who lack the ability to hire or retain skilled cybersecurity staff. According to the survey, 80 percent of respondents said that cloud hosting is in the top 20 priorities within their organizations. Just a few years ago that number would have been cut in half in most surveys I have read. There just wasn’t a lot of trust in these organizations that they could make the move, even if regulators allowed them. Read the article here.
Better Outcomes for Patients Through Digital Transformation: Guidance for Healthcare CIOs
Modernization efforts in the public and private sector stem from the fact that, across the board, organizations have been spending a lot of money on IT infrastructure and still aren’t able to deliver on the solutions that are needed to support either physicians or patients in the digital age, according to Chris Logan, Senior Healthcare Strategist for VMware. Healthcare organizations have been struggling with digital transformation for a while now, before even the HITECH Act (2009) became an impetus to modernize IT. Logan shared his take on how healthcare IT leaders are approaching modernization, whether healthcare leaders are comfortable enough with cloud solutions today, and what his customers ask first when considering moving data to the cloud. Read our Q&A with Logan on Government Technology Insider here.
