Cloud providers have a significant role to play in the healthcare sector – practices just need to understand the benefits.
Of the company bosses who are thinking about investing in – or even already using – the cloud, the vast majority are likely to cite a desire to boost profits as their main inspiration. In the healthcare sector, however, there’s a little more at stake. The efficiency and accuracy with which data is collected and stored can, at times, be a matter of life and death.
Electronic health records have been a part of hospital care for a number of years now. As is the case in many other sectors, though, the popularity of cloud-based storage is growing quickly. This new approach is particularly useful for small and medium-sized practices which don’t have their own central IT departments.
For a start, relying on the help of a cloud provider for data management services removes the need for the initial implementation of large-scale infrastructure. At first, this won’t necessarily be an issue, especially for a larger, funded healthcare establishment, but with internal systems comes the need for upgrades and regular
maintenance – both of which cost money and take time.
Then you have to think about staff. Medical staff can’t be expected to stay on top of a complex and ever-evolving IT system, which means that a dedicated team must be assembled. Again, with the appropriate skills in high demand, this won’t necessarily be cheap, let alone easy.
By removing the need to splash out on servers, stay up to date with regulatory requirements and employ a team of experts, the average healthcare practice should be in a much position to focus on the well-being of its patients.
