READ: These are the top 5 BYOD issues facing the healthcare industry

CITATION
 Crowell, C. (2013). These are the top 5 BYOD issues facing the healthcare industry  Retrieved May 24, 2013, from http://venturebeat.com/2013/04/26/top-5-byod-issues-facing-healthcare-industry/

URL
http://venturebeat.com/2013/04/26/top-5-byod-issues-facing-healthcare-industry/

Good article by the CEO of Enterasys, a security company.  He indicates 4 out of 5 doctors bring their own devices to work.  He indicates that while security and privacy are huge issues, there are others such as the heavy burden placed on the IT infrastructure of the healthcare organization.  He suggests that the IT support of the organization must be able to handle these 5 challenges:

1. Upgrade the infrastructure if necessary to meet the demand of all BYOD devices, those of doctors, nurses, staff, and patients.  Federal standards call for institutions to deploy a single network to handle the needs of the medical devices as well as provide a standard of interoperability for securing all data on the clinical wireless LAN.
2.  Have a strategy for lost devices as BYOD is not owned by the organization yet it may include patient data.  There must be a balance in strategy that takes into account the need to be noninvasive, yet law abiding. When dealing with patient information, anything that contains data covered by HIPAA needs to be secured, and those devices need to be able to be wiped clean.
3. Providing a solution for the mixing of personal and professional data as well as use of the BYOD.  The idea that personal devices may compromise professional behavior, and the concern that procedures may not be clear around professional vs. personal use on personal devices. BYOD in this environment requires a shift in culture that revolves around transparency. 
4. Ruggadize devices (provide subsidy) and put in place policies for proper sanitation of devices.
5. Application deployment across many different devices with different operating systems and even differences between the versions of the operating systems is a huge challenge.  There are more than 20,000 mHealth apps out there and trying to manage and monitor their deployments requires a comprehensive planning and policy.  IT and the mobile workforce must have the same goal in mind — patient safety and protection. From there, they can put clear policies in place.

The author further says that BYOD isn’t a passing fad. It’s here to stay, and organizations need to establish strategies and best practices to handle this ever-changing landscape.

By: Nima Zahadat