NHS Scotland has confirmed a purchase of a single sign-on and password reset (SSO/PR) solution from Lexington, Mass.-based Imprivata. The financial terms of the deal were not revealed. Imprivata will provide No Click Access^® to the many patient systems that run in hospitals and health communities across Scotland.

The Ponemon Institute recently conducted a survey to understand, from the view of IT and clinical leaders, the impact that single sign-on has on the healthcare industry. The results were fascinating. A clear majority of the 486 respondents said that single sign-on (SSO) significantly provides significant cost savings for hospitals, time savings for clinicians, and overall increased security and efficiency in healthcare organizations... Implementing a proven single sign-on solution, like Imprivata OneSign, is a simple means to an achievable end.

In support of its “Better Health, Better Care” initiative, a strategy and action plan established by the Scottish Government in 2007, NHS Scotland wanted to remove unnecessary cost, delays and better manage the workflow complexity associated with accessing electronic patient data. Building the best security was also a key priority to help protect the increasing volumes of sensitive information while allowing for maximum clinician-patient service improvement.

NHS Scotland has begun the implementation of a single sign-on and password re-set system for access to patient systems used in NHS facilities across Scotland. It has been supplied by management services company Imprivata and is being implemented through a partnership with Northgate Managed Services. Imprivita said it will enhance data security for health workers

NHS Scotland has deployed Imprivata's single sign-on technology across 97 hospitals and 1,300 GP practices. Selecting OneSign 4.5, Ronnie Monaghan, head of the e-Health programme at NHS Fife, said that it was chosen due to the combination of data security and employee work capability.

Expected to remove unnecessary cost, delays and better manage the workflow complexity associated with accessing electronic patient data NHS Scotland has selected Imprivata's No Click Access^®, a single sign-on and password reset (SSO/PR) offering to improve access to health systems, increase productivity and enhance data security for health workers across Scotland.

Lexington, MA-based Imprivata, a security tech company focused on health IT applications, said today it has landed a multimillion-dollar deal with NHS Scotland to provide secure access technology to that country’s healthcare workers. No further financial details were given in the release, but another report puts the price at 1.8 million pounds (just under U.S. $3 million) over five years.

The National Health Service in Scotland will implement single-sign-on and password reset software from Imprivata Inc. in hospitals and medical practices across the nation. Specific terms of the multimillion-dollar deal were not disclosed. Nearly 100 hospitals and 1,300 practices will use the software. Reseller Trustmarque Solutions secured the contract and another Imprivata partner, Northgate Managed Services, will implement and support the OneSign software.

Mac McMillan, CEO of Austin, Texas-based IT security firm CynergisTek and chair of the HIMSS Privacy & Security Policy Task Force, has some strong opinions about privacy protections in healthcare nowadays. The short version? Things could be a lot better.. Look at the number of breaches. Insider snooping is still rampant in healthcare. And that’s a cultural issue. It’s a cultural issue that says, ‘It’s OK for me to be looking at things that I’m not supposed to be looking at.’ Which goes right to the core of how the industry views security and confidentiality.

NHS Scotland contracts with Imprivata for its OneSign single sign-on and password reset solution.