Why Digital Identity Governance Matters for Clinicians, IT, and Compliance Officers
The COVID-19 pandemic profoundly impacted healthcare delivery organizations. Many HDOs were forced to quickly scale-up telehealth initiatives and remote-care options with little planning or notice. And many non-clinical employees (IT staff, financial personnel, marketing professionals, etc.) were forced to work from home—practically overnight. The pandemic reinforced how important it is for HDOs to closely monitor and tightly control access to healthcare applications and IT systems, without impairing user experience or disrupting productivity.
Last fall I had the pleasure of moderating a webinar with Imprivata Chief Medical Officer Dr. Sean Kelly and Microsoft Chief Nursing Information Officer Kathleen McGrow, where they talked about how COVID has transformed healthcare workflows and impacted security requirements. In that webinar we focused on the role automated identity governance solutions play in optimizing clinician experiences, improving patient care, and protecting PHI. Sean is still a practicing EMD and Kathleen has background as a trauma critical-care nurse, so they both know first-hand how today’s clinicians need fast, convenient, secure access to all their clinical applications—from any place at any time.
Sean and Kathleen reviewed some of the key functions that digital identity and access management solutions provide such as:
- Providing day-one access and role-based entitlements for clinicians and non-clinicians
- Enabling secure access for remote users—especially in the COVID and post-COVID era
- Provisioning and securing access to shared medical devices and mobile devices
- Maintaining audit trails for compliance
Imprivata and Microsoft: Enhanced Digital Identity Protection
Sean and Kathleen also described some of the ways Imprivata and Microsoft work together to help HDOs strengthen security, streamline workflows, and take full advantage of cloud economics, scalability, and agility.
Imprivata Identity Governance provides automated, role-based access controls for both on-premises applications and cloud applications—including EHRs and other clinical apps running on Microsoft Azure. The Imprivata solution is specifically designed and built for healthcare, with direct input from experienced clinicians like Sean. HDOs can use Imprivata Identity Governance to automatically provision and deprovision users into Azure applications. And they can also host the solution on Azure to avoid IT infrastructure cost and complexity, and accelerate time-to-value.
Imprivata OneSign provides fast, secure, no-click access to on-premises and cloud-based applications from fixed and mobile endpoints—including shared clinical devices like Microsoft Surface tablets and laptops. HDOs can use Imprivata OneSign to secure access to clinical and non-clinical applications hosted on Azure, as well as to secure access to SaaS solutions like Microsoft 365 and Microsoft Teams.
Learn More in our Upcoming Webinar: Clinical, IT, and Compliance -- IAM Co-Champions for Healthcare
I’m excited to announce that Kathleen will team up with Jaimin Patel from Imprivata for another webinar on April 28th. This time we’ll take a deeper look at how COVID has intensified the need for clinicians’ Day 1 access to critical systems and applications, and how it has highlighted the need for front-line managers to determine, approve and modify their employees’ access in real-time.
Kathleen and Jaimin will describe how threat actors turned their sights on HDOs during the pandemic. They’ll review some of the actions IT and Security organizations can take to fight back, like using automated identity management solutions to prevent unauthorized access to clinical and non-clinical applications, and using advanced analytics to proactively identify and pinpoint suspicious activity. And they’ll provide some additional examples of how, together, Imprivata and Microsoft help HDOs optimize workflows and strengthen security.
Now more than ever, Clinical, IT, and Compliance leaders must work together to boost clinician productivity, improve patient care, and mitigate risk. Join Kathleen McGrow, DNP, MS, RN, CNIO at Microsoft and Jaimin Patel, Product Lead, Identity Governance at Imprivata for an experience-driven discussion of digital identity management in healthcare. Ask your questions, as our speakers review real-world use cases and share how easy and powerful an automated identity management solution can be for healthcare.