Rural hospitals and small medical practices must be creative and open-minded when it comes to locking down their digital footprint, said Jim Roeder, vice president of IT at Lakewood Health System. There’s free help from private sector and government organizations and open-source tools that resource-constrained organizations can tap.
Such resources include programs launched last year by Microsoft and Google to provide free or lower-cost cybersecurity tools to rural and small healthcare clinics and assistance from government agencies, including the U.S. Cybersecurity Infrastructure and Security Agency, he said.
The need for such assistance runs deep for most rural and small facilities that serve patients with nowhere else to go. Recent research from the Health Sector Coordinating Council highlights that the stakes have moved from concerns about exposing patient data to concerns about cyberattacks resulting in patient harm – or death (see: Breach Roundup: UK NHS Links Patient Death to Ransomware Attack).
The coordinating council surveyed 40 executives of small, rural, critical access, federally qualified health centers across 30 states. Only 14% of healthcare organizations said their IT security teams are fully staffed. Roughly one in three said they are understaffed or severely understaffed and more than half said they need more help. Roeder is co-chair of the HSCC task group that conducted the study.
“To keep their patient data secure – you start to look at anything and everything you can leverage what’s available out there,” he said.
In the interview (see audio link below photo), Roeder also discussed:
- Top cybersecurity challenges faced by under-resourced medical practices;
- Other resources to help small, rural and other under-resourced healthcare entities bolster their cybersecurity;
- Top cybersecurity projects and priorities for his organization this year.
Roeder is vice president of IT at Lakewood Health System in Staples, Minnesota, which includes a 25-bed critical access hospital, five primary care clinics and senior housing facilities. He has 25 years of experience in IT, with 18 of those in the healthcare field. Roeder is a member of the HSCC Cybersecurity Working Group, including co-chair of its Underserved Provider Cybersecurity Task Group.