Resolving to make your clinic safe, secure, and compliant this year is critical. Healthcare data is an invaluable asset that must be handled with care. In 2018, we saw how data breaches cause significant financial damage, disruption of business operations, and harm to clinic reputations – and we don’t see that changing in 2019. To mitigate risk and help avoid costly breaches in the year ahead, here are three New Year’s resolutions that will protect your practice in 2019:
✓ Resolution #1: Engage a Privacy Professional
Change is constant; your Privacy Impact Assessment (PIA) needs to be updated regularly. Rules and regulations change, new threats emerge, technology is introduced, staff turnover occurs, and clinic processes evolve. Whether you still need to complete your PIA, or you have one in place, engaging an expert privacy support team who understands the PIA process is a worthy investment. You’ll have peace of mind in 2019, knowing your clinic is effectively protecting patient privacy, taking steps to combat cyber threats, and operating within the law.
✓ Resolution #2: Improve Patient Engagement with Secure-Mail
2019 Health IT trends are out, and according to Health Tech Magazine patient engagement ranked as the most critical issue in the coming year.
“We’ve seen an acceleration of [patients] running out of patience with the challenges they have engaging with the system,”saysDavidBetts. As a result, “coming to the fore is the need for a much more seamless, digitally enabled, customer-oriented experience of care.”
Show patients you’re listening with Brightsquid Secure-Mail, a digital communication tool that allows you to share Protected Health Information between practices and patients faster, easier, and more compliant than ever before.
✓ Resolution #3: Invest in Cyber Insurance
A cyberattack can shut down a clinic, and targeted attacks against healthcare are becoming more common every day. Achieving compliance within your clinic will help defend against threats. Privacy regulations establish best practice based on existing knowledge of clinic vulnerabilities. However, attackers are becoming more sophisticated, and new, ever-changing threats are popping up every day. Cyber insurance offers protection for unforeseen threats to the confidentiality of the patient information in your clinic.
How can your clinic best defend against the new generation of attacks?The short answer is: you can’t. According to CDW’s Cybersecurity Insight Report, “companies of all sizes must adopt a proactive approach that assesses and minimizes threats in advance while mitigating negative effects when a data breach does happen.”
While cyber insurance won’t protect your organization from cybercrime, it will keep you in business should a significant security event occur. Don’t be left unprotected. To learn more about Brightsquid Protect Cyber Insurance, contact crystal.w@brightsquid.com.