Getting Your Practice Ahead

Getting Your Practice Ahead

Volume 4: Data Backup Essentials For Physicians

Edited By : Vinod Venugopal

Disclaimer: The following document was created for free distribution by Technical Doctor Inc. The document

contains reference information from multiple sources.

Table of Contents

FOREWORD ... 2

ABSTRACT ... 2

1. WHAT DO YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT BACKUP AS A MEDICAL PRACTICE? ... 3

2. DATA SECURITY AND BACKUP SOLUTIONS IN HEALTHCARE ... 5

3. TIPS FOR A SECURE DATA BACKUP ... 7

4. IDEAL DATA BACK-UP TOOL: AN EXAMPLE FEATURE SET ... 10

SPECIAL OFFER ... 12

ABOUT TECHNICAL DOCTOR ... 13

WHAT NEXT? ... 14

FOREWORD

Many physicians are going through the EHR paradigm shift and have lost tremendous amount of money and time. Numerous patients have given poor feedback to their doctors after the practice moved to an EHR. Decade long relationships with their doctor slowly dissipate as patients become frustrated with their doctors lack of care because more attention is focused on computers.

Financially speaking, physicians have spent tens of hundreds of thousands of dollars on hardware,

consulting services, and EHR software costs and usually spend just as much time figuring out what should have been discovered during a workflow assessment.

Technical Doctor believes that continuing billing during the implementation, training physicians and staff members properly, and utilizing technology to assist in patient care is key to a successful EHR for every practice. These beliefs are what keep Technical Doctor ahead of all other IT companies.

We bring you this e-book series as an attempt to simplify technology for you and your staff, to help you appreciate technology and what it can do for you and practice.

ABSTRACT

Data Back-up is essential in a Medical practice to ensure prevention of data loss. Losing data can be

disastrous as a Medical Practice has sensitive information about a Patient’s medical and prescription history.

Ensuring that your Medical practice has a sound data backup policy is vital. The given e-book talks about the basics of data back-up and gives some examples.

Target Audience:

Physicians, Physician Practices, Hospitals, Medical Practice Managers

1. WHAT DO YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT BACKUP AS A MEDICAL PRACTICE?

As a Medical Practice or Hospital it is vital to make sure that your information is safe and secure. Backing up your data becomes a vital process in your quest for Meaningful Use and HIPAA compliance. It is also important to know what data needs to be backed up and for how long, what to give importance to and what to keep up to date.

The following types of Medical electronic data should be encrypted when backed up:

a. Patient billing and administrative information sent to bill management services and payers

b. Case Papers and referrals that are exchanged with payers, hospitals and billers c. Patient health information gathered from or displayed on a portal

d. Lab and clinical data electronically sent to and received from outside labs

e. Files used in transcription and any other patient reports that are transferred electronically f. E-mails between physicians, patients, and referring physicians and their respective

practices.

As per the HITECH Act the following is stated about Medical Record Backups and Contingency planning:

Required – HIPAA standard is mandatory / Addressable – HIPAA standard must be implemented unless an assessment and in-depth risk analysis conclude the implementation is not reasonable & appropriate to given business setting

(i) Contingency plan:

Establish (and implement as needed) policies and procedures for responding to an emergency or other

occurrence (for example, fire, vandalism, system failure, and natural disaster) that damages systems that

contain electronic protected health information.

(ii) Implementation specifications:

(A) Data backup plan (Required): Establish and implement procedures to create and maintain retrievable exact copies of electronic protected health information.

(B) Disaster recovery plan (Required): Establish (and implement as needed) procedures to restore any loss of data.

(C) Emergency mode operation plan (Required): Establish (and implement as needed) Procedures to enable continuation of critical business processes for protection of the security of electronic protected health information while operating in emergency mode.

(D) Testing and revision procedures (Addressable): Implement procedures for periodic testing and revision of contingency plans.

(E) Applications and data criticality analysis (Addressable): Assess the relative criticality of specific applications and data in support of other contingency plan components.

Simplifying the above guidelines about Medical Data Backup:

1. Having a Data Backup and Contingency plan is not optional for a Medical Practice.

2. Your saved Data should be recoverable from it stored Backup source.

3. As a part of the contingency plan at-least one of your Backups should be kept offsite.

4. The Data must be backed up on at minimum a daily basis to ensure that no disastrous data loss takes place.

5. If you are working in a contingency mode or using the backed up data, the updates hence forth should also be backed up and same security rules will apply.

6. Destroy any not used or expired data, especially if kept in movable devices like tapes, USBs etc.

7. Ensure that all movable devices storing ePHi data are kept securely and under lock and key.

8. Your Data Backup plans and Contingency plans should be on paper and filed as part of the documentation required for HIPAA compliance.

9. Regular testing of your Contingency Plan and Backup Plan must be done and above procedure modified if any loopholes are found.

10. Make sure all above guidelines are followed since the penalties and liabilities arising from non-

compliance are severe.

2. DATA SECURITY AND BACKUP SOLUTIONS IN HEALTHCARE

Data security is like exercise: Everyone knows it's good. Few people care enough to do it.

This is why it is important to have the right strategy and the right tools.

Computers, Keyboards, Mice and Even Hard drives fail. It's a fact of computing life. It's not a question of whether your computer will stop working or even a matter of when. The question is how much it will disrupt your life, your processes, your practice and your patients - and it won't, if you have a backup copy.

Backing up your data is the most indispensable thing you do on your computer. Two important considerations one must have when deciding a backup strategy are the backup media and the backup tools.

LOCAL BACKUP MEDIA:

Using CD/DVD’s to store data backups

Using CD/DVD’s to store data backups is popular. Blank CD/DVD’s are inexpensive, and copying data onto CD/DVD’s is easy. Unfortunately CD/DVD’s, like the floppy disks they've replaced, have a limited shelf life.

We don’t recommend this method of data backup for any practice.

Using tapes to store data backups

Tape backups are a many times more reliable than DVDs, but tape drives and

their associated media are many times more expensive than DVD writers and

CD/DVDs. A good tape drive can cost over $1000, and individual tapes for the

drive can cost up to $80 each. If one can afford the equipment, however, tape

backup is far more reliable and recommended backup method than CD/DVD.

Using external hard drives to store data backups

External hard disks are cheap compared to tape drive systems. They’re also easy to use as most of them support plug and play use with the computers USB port. And while hard drives do fail, their failure rate is much lower than that of other backup media such as DVD’s. A big factor to why we recommend External Hard Disks as the best Local backup medium is that a single hard disk drive or a maximum of 2 used for backups may well be enough to store your practice data.

ONLINE BACKUP IN THE CLOUD:

An online backup service offers the advantage of securely store your files at off-site server locations, so that your data stays intact and available even if your local disks, CD/DVD’s are corrupted or in a severe case… stolen.

With more and more emphasis on "cloud computing", it only makes sense that one should take advantage of this hot trend in technology for backups.

Factors to consider when choosing an online backup service:

Does it upload new and changed files immediately? Does it allow syncing or sharing of data? Can it back up files while you have them open? Is there a Web client for restoring? Is there a mobile client? Does it offer a remote control feature via my mobile phone? Can I view my backed up files on an iPad? How much will it cost? Is it HIPAA Compliant?

Limitations:

The advantages of Online Backup solutions can be limited due to bandwidth problems.

Secondly, the method is only as reliable as the company offering the online backup service.

Thirdly, one should ensure that HIPAA requirements are met by the vendor who is offering the Online

Backup Service

3. TIPS FOR A SECURE DATA BACKUP

A. General Tips:

1. As per the HIPAA guidelines “Establish and implement procedures to create and maintain retrievable exact copies of electronic protected health information”.

2. Prepare an overall Data backup plan. This plan includes what data is backed up, where it is backed up, and how often. Segregate your Data into files/folders which need to be backed up every day, every week and every month.

3. Use software that automatically backs up your drive at a scheduled time every day.

4. For speed and security select a backup software that can

a. Perform incremental backups.

b. Gives options for both Local and Online backup simultaneously

5. Backup software gives you the choice of how far back you want to be able to recover data. For

certain files & folders you may only need to recover the most recent version, but you may need

to reference patient records as far back as seven years ago.

B. Local Backup

1. If your backup is done locally, make sure you have a UPS (Uninterrupted power supply) connected to backup devices also to ensure no loss of data.

2. Don't save your data on the same partition where your

operating system and programs are installed - it will be much easier to restore/reinstall operating system without harming the data.

3. Use NTFS/NTFS5 file system instead of FAT16/32 if your operating system is Windows.

4. If you are doing a local backup make sure a copy is also taken on a CD / DVD / External Disk which is stored off-site in case of a fire or another office destroying event.

5. If you live in an area that can flood, don't store your backup in the basement.

6. Be sure to test your backup periodically and make sure the data being backed up is correct and

usable.

C. Online Backup

1. Select an online backup provider which securely stores your Medical data at 2 locations at the minimum.

2. Make sure the your online backup provider has clearly stated its Backup and Recovery plan in case of a natural disaster in the Service Level Agreement.

3. Prefer a provider who is providing a Version History and access to older versions of the same file.

4. Select a provider who provides 128-bit SSL encryption whenever in transit.

4. IDEAL DATA BACK-UP TOOL: AN EXAMPLE FEATURE SET

1. The Backup is run in the background without down-time so you can stay productive.

2. The Backup is encrypted and compressed with HIPAA password-protected (AES 256-bit).

3. The Backup can be retrieved immediately for individual, incremental or full backup restoration.

4. The data is backed up by the software online at multiple locations to guard against geographical disasters.

5. The Backup software can perform Intra-Daily Incremental backups without any performance degradation.

6. Backup checks can be performed easily and daily.

7. The Backup software stores Data in a format which can be retrieved easily, even if the software is not subscribed to anymore.

8. The Backup software has fully flexible scheduling options: Monthly, weekly, daily, hourly or instant backup.

9. The Backup software employs Intelligent File Filters, which automatically know which file should be backed up where and at what duration.

10. The Backup software allows you to easily increase the Number of Computers from which to

Backup and also to recover from all of your Machines

not unlimited versions to make sure you can view an older version of the document.

12. The Backup software should also keep a file deleted from your connected PC for a specific period of time if not forever, for future emergency access.

13. The Backup software should allow URL based access to the data if required under a secure Username and Password.

14. The Backup software should have an easy to use Management console and an easily accessible

Help file.

SPECIAL OFFER

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ABOUT TECHNICAL DOCTOR

Technical Doctor is the leading provider for all information technologies within a physician’s practice and/or hospital group. Technical Doctor was found in 2006 and has continuously provided up-to-date Healthcare News and Healthcare Technology solutions.

Technical Doctor only hires qualified HIT (healthcare information technologists) members that understand a physicians practice and workflow. Technical Doctor believes that continuing billing during the implementation, training physicians and staff members properly, and utilizing technology to assist in patient care is the key to a successful EHR for every practice. These beliefs are what keep Technical Doctor ahead of all other IT companies.

Technical Doctor provides EHR implementation consulting, on-going IT support, website development and SEO, Dragon dictation, HIPAA compliant backups, EHR workflow assessments, EHR training and consulting, EHR hardware readiness assessments, and the EHR selection process.

Contact Information

Website: http://www.technicaldr.com Email: [email protected]

Social Media Information

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/technicaldr Twitter: @technicaldr

Tel No:+1-630-433-7453 Fax No:+1-630-757-4284 Toll No:+1-877-910-0004

Partners

WHAT NEXT?

Interested in a having your Medical Data backed up? Contact TechnicalDr to start the process.

If you have doubts and questions about your Data Backup policies you can also talk to us: contact TechnicalDr.

Also if you are interested in any of the following services:

1. EHR Selection

2. EHR Training and Consulting 3. Medical Website Essentials

4. HIPAA Compliant Data Backup Solutions 5. HIPAA Compliant Email Solutions

6. Dragon Dictation Medical 7. IT Hardware for you Practice 8. IT Support Solutions

You can contact TechnicalDr by clicking here.