How Can Health Care Innovate With Cybersecurity in Mind?
There are many answers to these question, but perhaps the best response is to point to leaders and organizations that are recognized by their peers as top models to follow -- right now.
I know of no one better to address these questions than
To understand their scope,
According to the
Patrick joined VITAS in 2013 as a key member of a senior management team that has successfully steered the organization through rapid, continued growth. He oversees all aspects of VITAS technology, cybersecurity and is also responsible for the Care Connection Center, a nationwide VITAS call center that delivers admissions services and after-hours clinical care.
Known as a pioneer in mobile solutions, Patrick and his teams shaped a partnership with Apple,
Patrick has a professional management style which is not only winning and assertive, but is also kind, direct and trust-building. Pat delivered positive business results using technology in government, and later delivered great results at
I am grateful for Pat's support and encouragement to me during a time when he was about to leave state government in
More than 10 years later, I am not surprised that Pat's team continues to lead the nation in building innovative solutions that make a difference for the global health-care industry.
Exclusive Interview Between
DL: When you first moved to
PH: Probably our most lauded advancement has been the Patient Experience Improvement initiative. In 2014
Interoperability: The VITAS patient experience begins long before admission to our care. Availability of information and coordination of a patient's transition is the most crucial and most impactful stage of care. Our interoperability solution transfers medical chart data in real time to our clinical team in the field. Information is also shared with the referring provider, giving them up-to-the-minute data on their patient's progression.
Mobility: Care at VITAS is given in many settings, the home, hospital, nursing homes and LTACs [Long-Term Acute Care facilities]. Clinical workers are enabled with secure, fully native mobile solutions that make charting easier, communications immediate and coordination of care seamless. Every VITAS physician, nurse, chaplain and social worker is outfitted with a mobile device that serves as their clinical workstation. Once a patient's record is transferred to VITAS from any EMR [electronic medical record], it is instantly made available at the bedside. Mobility gives our clinicians real-time data and connectivity in any care setting, wherever the bedside may be.
Logistics: Employing the latest techniques in business analytics, VITAS uses data as a strategic tool for decision-making and the deployment of care. This capability is further enhanced with intuitive nationwide workflow systems that monitor progress and ensure that resources throughout the country are managed to optimal effect.
DL: Moving forward, how do you see virtual reality fitting into health-care service delivery?
PH: Virtual reality is probably one of the most exciting emerging technologies in health care. When we think about people facing life-limiting illness two things are almost always at the top of their care goals:
Being lucid and able to interact with their loved ones
Being pain free
Virtual reality has proven to be very powerful as a tool for distraction therapy. The 4K experiences available offer an experience that lowers a patient's pain, reduces the need for opioid medication and can be used to create shared experiences with loved ones. VR allows a patient who is physically unable to leave the house to attend a wedding, to see a part of the world they always longed to visit or travel home one last time without ever leaving their bed. In 2019 we are taking those virtual experiences mobile over the 5G network (thanks to our partnership with
DL: You have won some amazing awards as CIO across multiple industries. How do you motivate your teams?
PH: So much of what we need to do as leaders is to communicate how important every contribution is. As human beings we all have the need to know our work matters. Whether you are answering the phone in our help desk, responsible for database administration or developing a new mobile application, your efforts make a huge difference. At VITAS, we recognize that big things happen in the small moments. Huge, impactful projects are made up of thousands of mundane moments where our employees have a choice to settle for "good enough" or challenge themselves to excellence. We constantly ask ourselves "If that was my sister or my father being cared for, what tools would I want their nurse to have at her fingertips?" We encourage our teams to have the audacity to imagine a better tomorrow and the tenacity to do everything we can to make that happen.
DL: How do you see cybersecurity fitting into your technology plans and new innovative strategies at
PH: It's simply paramount. Our systems have to be trusted, they have to be secure. Security is so challenging and has been doubly so given our commitment to mobile. It is one thing to keep your systems safe, it's quite another to think about that access remaining secure over a host of vectors (internal network, guest Wifi or over a cellular connection). We ended up using a 3 factor authentication method for all data access (reading and writing) that is transaction based, agile, bandwidth-light and effective. If we have a technology "secret sauce" this is definitely it. It is one of the things we are most proud of.
DL: When you look wider at the healthcare industry as a whole, what are the biggest challenges your see over the next decade?
PH: I see challenges as opportunities. If it was easy, not very many of us would have jobs right? Health care in the
DL: As far as cybersecurity in hospitals nationwide, where are the biggest security weaknesses? For example, is ransomware the greatest threat currently?
PH: We have certainly seen health care becoming more and more of a target. Email remains our most attacked vector, but it is by no means the only one. I honestly think the biggest IT failure or risk is not asking for or justifying a robust security budget. I get to interact with hospital CEOs and CFOs all across the country who all list cybersecurity as one of their top three highest concerns. More often than not, their complaint is that they are just not seeing a thoughtful request for funding or detailed enough security planning/road maps. That problem lies 100 percent with the CIO, too often security initiatives are seen as expensive insurance policies and put off for years. In reality, if we (the CIO) wait too long to invest in increasing the effectiveness of our security, we set our organizations up for extremely big "hits" down the road when one year's budget has to make up for five years of delayed investment.
DL: What is the security industry missing? What can we do better?
PH: We need more of you. This field of study is one I really push and mentor for with the youth I work with. Our society will become increasingly automated and there will always be those trying to take advantage of that. What field of study could you imagine that would have better job security? I think we all need to do a better job letting young people know how vital and exciting the world of cybersecurity is.
Closing Comments
I never cease to be amazed by the industry-leading work that former government leaders perform each and every day.
Far from the narrative that the only people who work in government are those who "can't cut it in the private sector," I have seen numerous government technology and cybersecurity leaders go on to be global leaders in banking, transportation, insurance, health care and many other fields.
I encourage all critical infrastructure sectors to take a close look at what
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