A study by HIMSS Analytics found that many hospitals rely on outdated practices to backup and archive patient data, putting the data at risk. The study surveyed 150 IT professionals and found that most hospitals classify 75% of clinical data as "active" and store it on-site, even though less than 30% is accessed after 18 months. Many hospitals also lack data archiving strategies and disaster recovery plans. The outdated practices put unnecessary pressure on IT budgets and cast doubts on hospitals' ability to deliver care in emergency situations.

1. Poor processes put patient data at risk
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2. Study by HIMSS Analytics
• According to a study published recently by HIMSS
Analytics, a large number of hospitals depend on
outdated and inefficient practices to backup and
archive their patient data
• The survey undertaken by HIMSS comprised of 150
senior IT professionals from across the nation to
assess how they protect data from potential loss and
archive it to meet compliance requirements
• The findings were nevertheless not very surprising.
Inconsistent processes adopted by healthcare
organizations are putting patient data at risk and
putting unnecessary pressure on IT storage budgets

3. Clinical data
• Most respondents said they classify an average of
75% of their clinical data as “active” – meaning they
store it on-site for immediate access
• A surprising practice given that less than 30% of this
data is accessed after 18 months, and could be
moved to more cost-effective storage mediums,
according to the report
• Hospitals are also not in a practice of having data
archiving strategies

4. Hospitals
• Barely more than half of hospitals said they did have
one in place, out of which 83% said they did it
because of compliance reasons
• Hospitals need to know that much of the archived
data is not accessed over time and a good strategy
can reduce their IT budgets to a great extent
• More alarmingly, 31% of the hospitals did not have a
disaster recovery and business continuity plans in
place, casting serious doubts over their ability to
deliver care in an emergency situation

5. Hospitals
• Another 42% of the respondents said they do not
have a documented data retention policy that
specifies how long they can store backup and
archival data for before destroying it
• “The amount of data flowing through our healthcare
system today has rendered the old ways of managing
it obsolete,” said Michael Leonard, director of
product management, healthcare IT services for Iron
Mountain

6. Read more on blog.curemd.com
• To read more on this topic, visit:
• http://blog.curemd.com/poor-processes-put-
patient-data-at-risk/

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