PDF《VMware vCloud?》

VMware vCloud? for Healthcare and HIPAA/HITECH W h i t e p a p e r VMware vCloud for Healthcare and HIPAA/HITECH w h i t e p a p e r /

2 Table of Contents Executive Summary.

3 Examining Virtualization, Cloud and Healthcare IT

3 Reviewing HIPAA and HITECH.4 Introducing vCloud for Healthcare .

4 Overcoming Security and Compliance Obstacles

5 Improving HIPAA and HITECH Compliance with vCloud for Healthcare.6 Implementing Four Key Recommendations.7 Establish a Trusted Zone for PHI.7 Scan for Sensitive Data.9 Enable Continuous Configuration Compliance.11 Remove Data From Endpoints to Prevent Data Theft or Loss.

12 Checking Your Compliance and Contacting VMware.13 w h i t e p a p e r /

3 VMware vCloud for Healthcare and HIPAA/HITECH Executive Summary Heavily regulated industries such as healthcare face unique information technology challenges. While driving down costs and improving the quality and delivery of patient care, healthcare providers must comply with a growing number of government mandates and rapidly changing industry practices surrounding the privacy and security of personal health information (PHI). With looming deadlines, such as meeting the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act meaningful use requirements, healthcare providers are looking to virtualization and cloud computing to provide the flexibility and efficiency benefits they need to meet their agility and compliance goals, at lower cost. But not all cloud solutions are designed to deliver what is truly needed―and only one solution provides a complete and integrated cloud infrastructure that can help meet stringent Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and HITECH requirements. VMware vCloud? for Healthcare transforms the cost, quality and delivery of patient care and provides the necessary control and transparency for regulated healthcare organizations to establish and maintain HIPAA and HITECH compliance in their virtual and cloud environments. Examining Virtualization, Cloud and Healthcare IT Virtualization has been a longtime trend in information technology. Early adopters concentrated resources on large dedicated hardware platforms such as mainframes. Then VMware pioneered the common practice of subdividing centralized resources using virtual-machine software to help organizations across industries lower capital expenses and maximize the use of their computing resources. Virtualization has since been extended to servers, network devices, storage and desktops―and it is widely regarded as the foundation for cloud computing. With support for virtualization from the world'

s leading electronic medical record (EMR) and medical imaging vendors, healthcare IT has accelerated its adoption of virtualization―and cloud computing―to help power even the most critical patient-care systems. Yet today, some providers remain skeptical that virtual and cloud infrastructure can adequately address their unique security and compliance requirements. The primary reasons for their skepticism are ? Ever-changing government-mandated security and compliance requirements C Forced to deploy critical systems on isolated, dedicated physical devices―with every application vendor typically requiring its own unique hardware and software stack―IT teams are challenged to support continually unforeseen changes in healthcare IT environments where processes are complex, time-consuming and manual. ? Complex relationships between disparate clinical applications C Healthcare IT teams have the difficult task of managing information flows between large numbers of integrated and interfaced applications that all share PHI to create a consolidated patient record. ? Increasingly mobile caregivers C Laptops, tablets and other mobile devices are becoming preferred methods of information access for busy, on-the-go physicians, and physicians'