Blog Listing

At Parkview Adventist Medical Center we're very proud of our accomplishment of being only one of a handful of hospitals that have been awarded with HIMSS Analytics Stage 6 status.Moving to an EMR format and a paperless environment requires a significant commitment from the executive team and from our clinicians. As we began our move to EMR, we had two major concerns. 1 – Can we maintain patient data security and HIPAA compliance in an electronic format? 2 – Will the clinicians buy into what we’re doing and use the technologies we provide? These are two critical components in achieving Stage 6 status.…

The discussion on desktop virtualization, or hosted virtual desktop, is heating up. Some view it as futuristic. Others say it is throwback to the world of mainframe computing. With economic concerns forcing businesses to take a hard look at expenses across the enterprise, however, there are many reasons this is such a hot topic.…

Managing the Increasing Vulnerability of a Decentralized Workforce More and more companies today are enabling employees and partners to work remotely, accessing networks, data and applications from just about anywhere to be productive. Being productive is good. Behaving less responsibly is not. I was reading that Cisco Systems commissioned a survey to examine the security behavior of remote workers, and I found some of the findings startling -- here's a few that stood out for me:…

I read an interesting story over at HealthcareInfoSecurity.com highlighting the “Official Breach Tally Approaches 100”. The article includes a link to the official federal list of healthcare information breaches that was launched a few short months ago. While the article highlighted the major breaches affecting 500+ individuals as reported to the HHS Office for Civil Rights (OCR) and called out 61% of incidents stemming from stolen computer devices (e.g., laptops, USB drives, hard drives etc.), many of the largest breaches involved unauthorized access. Here’s a snapshot at the major breaches stemming from unauthorized access...…

This week, Computerworld announced the honorees for its annual Premier IT Leaders awards program, and we’d like to congratulate Imprivata customer Bill McQuaid of Parkview Adventist Medical Center for making the 2010 list! Bill was recognized for his innovative approach to electronic medical records (EMR) and the significant contribution he has made to Parkview’s healthcare IT infrastructure.…

Congratulations to Imprivata customer Parkview Adventist Medical Center for recently earning the HIMSS Analytics Stage 6 designation! HIMSS Analytics highlights the Stage 6 award as recognition for hospitals that have made significant investments in healthcare IT and as well as implementing paperless medical records. This is a remarkable achievement for Parkview, considering that they’re one of only 42 hospitals out of 5,166 in the US to attain this level.…

A recent Gartner Blog Network post and Wall Street Journal article both focus on new, stricter data regulations being passed in several states, including Massachusetts. The final set of the Massachusetts regulations focus on restricting employee access to data, monitoring malicious activity on the network, and strong authentication protocols. The new regulations will go into effect beginning January 1, 2009.…

Users from temporary staff all the way up to the corner office complain about ‘drowning in security.' Why does it take four more passwords to open an email at work in some cases than to check a bank balance via the home PC? The things that make a car safe - airbags, safety glass, crumple zones, etc. - are not obvious to the driver. What lessons can we adopt from hidden security measures to make security less of a drag on employee performance?…

I often have conversations with customers about the level of effort that is required to support OneSign once it is deployed. We usually talk about the resources that are required to work on testing new application profiles or changes to existing profiles, but if you back up one level, you will see the X factor.…

Last week, ecfirst's CEO, Ali Pabrai joined me for a live webinar that discussed a checklist for healthcare IT Security compliance. If you missed the webinar, you won't want to miss this -- we've gone ahead and transcribed our answers from the Q&A session. Question 1: Where can I go to find out exactly which set of rules / regulations apply to my business? There are so many different ones which change often that it's difficult to stay current. Answer: That is one of the areas that must be addressed in a comprehensive risk analysis activity. It’s critical to keep up with HITECH Act changes. The best source is the OCR site at www.hhs.gov. Also, it’s important to keep up with State regulations, especially CA, Massachusetts, etc.…

Following the announcement that NHS Scotland had selected Imprivata to provide single sign-on for all of its health workers across Scotland, the Scottish Government has published an update to their e-health strategy for 2011-2017.…

Recent survey results released show only 50.7% of U.S. hospitals with implemented electronic medical records (EMRs). While transitioning to a paperless system seems to be a logical evolution in the health care system, the rather slow rate of EMR adoption does not surprise me. Even with the passage of the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act (HITECH) in February 2009 which attached a monetary incentive to implementation, technologies that do not seamlessly fit into clinicians’ day-to-day activities, improve patient care, and enable them to work more efficiently fail to achieve widespread acceptance. In order to improve EMR adoption rates in the U.S., we must provide doctors with tools that do not disrupt time spent with the patients, while enhancing their ability to access vital information quickly and efficiently.…

The highlight of today was undoubtedly the customer panel in the session Healthcare and the Journey to the Cloud- State of the Industry.…

There' s been a lot of talk and focus on the Meaningful Use provisions of the HITECH Act. I worry that we're becoming too focused on the details of Meaningful Use, and losing the bigger picture. The government instituted the Meaningful Use criteria and incentives because they believe that electronic medical records can improve quality of care and access to care – but only if the EMR solutions are actually deployed and used. Hence Meaningful Use.…

Many agencies that I’ve spoken to are not aware of the Advanced Authentication requirements of the FBI CJIS Security Policy 5.6.2.2 and are therefore not aware that they may be in breach of this requirement. This video will quickly enable you to find out whether you may be in breach and how Imprivata can put you back in compliance.…

Last month, Kristi Roose from Mahaska Health Partnership joined me for a live webinar that discussed deploying SSO and Strong Authentication, and the steps you can take to get to Meaningful Use faster. If you missed the webinar, you won't want to miss this -- we've gone ahead and transcribed our answers from the Q&A session. Question 1: How long did it take to roll a unit out to all the departments and how long did it take to see acceptance to the change? Answer: We approached these rollouts one unit at a time, and the time frame depended on the number of users. Usually it took about 1-2 weeks per unit to make sure that everyone was comfortable with the product. Once the unit was rolled out acceptance was immediate; customers were grateful for the product and relieved to be able to access data more easily. It was a relief for their workflow. …

Day 2 is now in full swing at VMworld 2011. We had a very busy Day 1 yesterday. While the show attendance was clearly impacted by Irene, it sure feels like there are 15,000+ VMworld attendees here in sunny Vegas.…

I’m extremely excited about our participation in this year’s show particularly the opportunity to demonstrate the results of our collaboration and integration with some of our partners. Imprivata is working in conjunction with VMware, Teradici, Dell, and VCE to showcase our joint solutions, which showcase VMware View serving up virtual desktops,…

Professional Services are not something that should only be considered during the initial implementation of Imprivata OneSign. As our customer base has grown through the years, we’ve seen their personnel come and go, departments change, infrastructure develop and new technology appear. What doesn’t change is the need to provide simple secure access even though regulations get more rigorous and security threats become greater.…

Head over to the Imprivata booth #1070 to take a look at the tech preview of the joint development between Teradici and Imprivata. And just in case it’s too busy to get close, you can also see it at the VMware, Teradici, Dell and VCE stands. Yes, it’s that cool. While you’re there, ask Michelle for some sonic rocks – I hear they’re kind of fun...…