Securing IT in Healthcare: Part II
Topics: Culture Internet of Things Risk Management
With billions of federal dollars accelerating US investments in health IT, securing patient data has become a significant concern. As part of our NSF-funded Trustworthy Information Systems for Healthcare (TISH), the Center is collaborating with the Institute for Security, Technology, and Society (ISTS) to conduct research on the impact of security investments on patient data breaches. That topic is one of several panels at the Workshop on Securing IT in Healthcare (SITH2). The workshop is the second in a series where we brought together a multidisciplinary group of leading experts in the arena of health information technology. SITH2 will examine the current state of the field and confront continuing challenges for information security and privacy in health care, by once again bringing together leading experts from computer science, health policy, medicine, psychology and sociology.
This year we are honored that Dr. David Blumenthal, the former National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, presented the Keynote Address. The SITH2 workshop is hosted in association with both TISH and SHARPS (Strategic Healthcare IT Advanced Research Projects on Security) research projects.
Panel 1: “Usability and Healthcare Data Breaches”
Chaired by Eric Johnson
Usability failures – of both systems and embedded security – lead to user workarounds and security failures. In many areas of healthcare, workarounds are epidemic. Such workarounds, whether clinical or back office, create new information risks and patient data hemorrhages. In this panel, we explored how usability issues and workarounds lead to security failures and how those failures can be prevented. (From an academic and information security professional perspective.)
Panelists:
Ritu Agarwal, University of Maryland
Eric Cowperthwaite, Chief Information Security Officer, Providence Health & Services
Khaled El Emam, Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario Research Institute
Paul Connelly, Vice President and Chief Information Security Officer, Hospital Corporation of America
Usability and Healthcare Security
Professor Johnson and Providence Health & Services’ CISO, Eric Cowperthwaite, discuss healthcare security and usability.
