News
Secure storage and patient data the most pressing issues for
hospital IT worldwide
16 June 2010
A global survey by BridgeHead Software, has shown that secure
data management is the healthcare industry's most pressing issue as
hospitals move from paper-based health records to electronic systems.
The Data Management Healthcheck 2010, a global survey into
hospitals' ongoing strategies for managing their IT systems, found that
the top IT spending priority for 2010 was disaster recovery (44%), closely followed by
PACS
(38%) and digitising paper records (35%).
John McCann, Director of Marketing at BridgeHead Software, said, "The
healthcare industry's data environment is notoriously complex, with most
hospitals navigating a variety of systems from a range of vendors for
managing different types of clinical data in different locations, both
on and off hospital premises.
"When healthcare information systems go
down, bringing that information back online is an intricate process.
Healthcare IT professionals need to know which applications and data
have to be reinstated, and in which order. Given this complexity, it is
not surprising that disaster recovery is the top IT investment priority
in healthcare today."
Tony Cotterill, CEO and President at BridgeHead Software, added,
"Roughly 20 to 30% of all the world's storage resides in
healthcare. Yet hospitals often find themselves accepting storage and
disaster recovery solutions from other industry sectors that do not
necessarily understand and accommodate the healthcare industry's
uniquely complex data environment.
"As hospitals continue transitioning
towards fully electronic patient records, they would be wise to
investigate storage, data management and disaster recovery solutions
tailored specifically to meet their own organisational needs."
As BridgeHead Software reported last month, the Data Management
Healthcheck also found that over two-thirds (69%) of healthcare
organisations expected their data volumes to increase this year. Of
those, the majority (65%) said PACS imaging files were the main
culprits, followed by files held in the electronic patient record (45.5%) and scanned documents, eg proof of insurance and
healthcare proxy (43%). In spite of rising data volumes, only a
quarter (26%) claimed to have full archiving capabilities that
migrated content to the appropriate storage as dictated by their
pre-defined policies.
Only 15% of respondents listed cloud storage among their top
three investment priorities, in spite of the recent buzz around cloud
computing. And only 12% prioritised green IT: further
confirmation of BridgeHead Software's April report that green IT is
currently more of an aspiration than a reality at most hospitals.
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