Medical Practices

Independent primary care, urgent care, specialty and multi-provider practices — usually without dedicated staff whose job is technology.

Industry

Medical Practices

Sound familiar

A bad hour costs you a week — When your EHR is unreachable, providers chart on paper and the schedule never recovers. Rebooking a full day of patients takes far longer than the outage did.

Your office manager became the IT department — Nobody gave them that job. They took it because someone had to, and it sits on top of everything else they do.

Everyone blames someone else — Your EHR vendor points at your internet provider, who points at whoever set up your network. You're left holding it.

Nobody has ever tested your backup — There's a backup running somewhere. If you asked how long a restore takes and whether it would work, could anyone tell you?

Storage runs out mid-clinic — Imaging grows quietly until a drive fills up, usually on a busy morning with no warning.

People leave and their logins stay — When staff move on, their access often doesn't.

What you're held to

A written risk analysis — HIPAA requires a documented, accurate assessment of the risks to your patient data. It's the item small practices are most often missing entirely — and the first thing asked for after an incident. (45 CFR 164.308(a)(1)(ii)(A))

Agreements with your vendors — Any company handling patient data on your behalf needs a Business Associate Agreement, including whoever handles your IT. (45 CFR 164.502(e), 164.308(b), 164.314(a))

Breach notification — If patient data is exposed, notice is required without unreasonable delay and no later than 60 days from discovery. (45 CFR 164.400-414)

Knowing who looked at what — Your systems need to record activity, and someone needs to review it. (45 CFR 164.312(b))