TeleQuality Communications: Telcos Can’t Ignore Healthcare Sector
How can telecommunications companies extend their reach? TeleQuality Communications Health IT Engineer Jared Alfson said he believes the telehealth market is key.
Alfson noted “telcos can no longer ignore the rising demand for comprehensive telecom solutions in the healthcare sector” during a presentation at last week’s Telco Cloud World Forum North America Conference & Exhibition in Dallas.
“With more and more hospitals investing in electronic health records (EHR), cloud technology opens up the possibility of extreme accessibility and mobility of patients’ digitized health information,” Alfson said. “Increased speed, decreased costs, scalable solutions and collaboration among multiple outlets make cloud technology economic sense for all healthcare providers.”
Telehealth is “the use of electronic information and telecommunications technologies to support long-distance clinical healthcare, patient and professional health-related education, public health and health administration,” according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
A recent MarketsandMarkets study showed the global healthcare cloud computing market could be worth $5.4 billion by 2017, and Alfson pointed out telecom providers are in position to take advantage of this market’s growth.
“Telcos are uniquely positioned to capitalize on the expansion because they can provide all-inclusive information and communications technology (ICT) solutions such as medical monitoring and mobile health applications that complement cloud services,” he said.
How can telcos capitalize on the telehealth market?
An Aug. 2014 Frost & Sullivan study showed nearly half of the IT decision makers in healthcare companies across the U.S. and Europe have moved the majority of their enterprise communications to the cloud.
The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), however, remains a major concern for many healthcare providers, Alfson said.
HIPAA regulations were designed to help patients receive medical care without compromising their right to privacy and ensure protected health information (PHI) is secure yet accessible for healthcare providers.
Alfson noted telecom companies can comply with HIPAA regulations if they follow IT security best practices.
“Good IT security best practices that have been around the IT security industry position you very well to accommodate the HIPAA security rules. The principles have existed in IT for a long time but are often ignored as best practices due to time constraints or in favor of more convenient operating practices. Brushing up on solid IT security practices is a great place to start,” he told Talkin’ Cloud.
Telecom providers also can collect feedback from healthcare companies to better support these businesses’ cloud needs.
“Our goal as partners should be to bring a value to customers that is difficult for them to achieve on their own,” Alfson added. “We have to engage in meaningful conversations with them in order to understand what challenges [they face].”
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