Privacy and security of an individual’s healthcare data is paramount. One of the most common concerns about cloud computing is how secure is it to have all your health data accessible via an Orion Health platform on a cloud-based server?

This is especially important when healthcare organisations need to comply with regulatory requirements like the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) for the protection of personal data, or the US Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) for secure data portability, or meet HITRUST Alliance’s CSF, an industry-mediated certifiable standard for safeguarding sensitive information.

Cloud providers can manage data, keep security solutions up-to-date, document access and provide reports that the end-user needs to prove compliance.

Cloud computing makes security a top priority

The cloud is configured to protect your information. It can improve the ability of healthcare organisations to meet core security and compliance requirements, such as data locality, protection and confidentiality with comprehensive services and features. The cloud also allows organisations to automate manual security tasks, so your organisation does not have to struggle to keep up with the current requirements.

Orion Health Cloud makes security a top priority, with data protection measures and defences in place to keep infrastructure and your healthcare organisation’s important clinical data secure. On Amazon Web Services (AWS), healthcare organisations can gain access to an environment built for the world’s most secure organisations. In addition, AWS makes security easier by managing over 1800 security controls – so you don’t have to.

The need for data security

With a rise in cybersecurity attacks, healthcare organisations need to ensure that precious healthcare information is safely secured in a robust environment that is monitored 24/7. With Orion Health Cloud, we relieve organisations of the burden of managing this in-house.

Every deployment on AWS comes with out of the box security, redundancy and resilience, ensuring sensitive healthcare information held in EHRs complies with legally mandated requirements for data security and compliance. There are also options for disaster recovery services, where remote cloud computing can be used to regularly back up a healthcare organisation’s clinical data and systems, further protecting vital clinical information and records from data loss.

On-premise versus cloud servers

If a healthcare organisation has an on-premise solution and the equipment fails, clinical data may be lost. This is a potential breach of requirements that healthcare organisations cannot afford to risk. On-site digital data storage infrastructures have challenges, such as the frequency of software upgrades required and the retention of IT personnel who are trained in data security.

Cloud-based platforms, such as AWS, help to increase the security and durability of essential healthcare data by providing out of the box compliance with regulatory guidelines. Orion Health Cloud on AWS enables healthcare organisation users to securely access information whenever needed as it includes automation of backups and disaster recovery options. In the unfortunate case of a failure, healthcare organisations don’t lose any data and can minimise the downtime for their users.

Orion Health Cloud provides security, risk management and monitoring services to protect users from unauthorised access and prevent unauthorised information access.

In a Healthcare IT News article, healthcare thought-leader, John Halamka, noted, “I predict that five years from now none of us will have datacentres. We’re going to go out to the cloud to find EHRs, clinical decision support, analytics.”

Keep your precious healthcare data secure with Orion Health Cloud

Orion Health Cloud provides clients with secure access to a cloud-based healthcare solution stack delivered as a tailored SaaS model. Our professionals build trusted, open and collaborative relationships with our clients to help alleviate the pressure of managing and maintaining complex health IT ecosystems and ensure you are maximising the value of your digital health solution investments.

As an AWS Partner, Orion Health leverages the computing power and scalability of AWS, taking advantage of machine learning technologies, increasing uptime and driving better outcomes which enables healthcare organisations to care for millions of patients. The scalable and resilient infrastructure, breadth of services and focus on security make AWS Orion Health’s cloud-based platform of choice.

Interested in learning more about Orion Health Cloud?

Contact an expert

This blog is the second in the series on cloud computing. The next blog discusses enabling cost-effective digital health technology with the cloud.

Read our previous blog on Six reasons why cloud computing is appealing for healthcare.