Modern technology and communications are evolving at an astonishing speed.

Encrypted smartphone based applications are an incredibly efficient and effective way of getting information to your admin team whilst you are on the spot with your trauma patient, speeding up the process and reducing the time needed to organise potentially life or limb saving surgery.  Or to send through information for your on call late night cases so they can be set up in your software and billed in a timely manner.

It all seems like such a good idea.  And it is, but…

There is always a catch.  In this instance it isn’t the application itself that poses the issue, but where the information is going.  Having these applications on your employee’s personal devices presents 2 significant issues.

The first issue that presents itself is that if the application is on a staff member’s personal device any information sent through to that staff member is not protected by your practice’s IT security measures.  If images or documents are transmitted this way, often the staff member will need to use their personal email address to then on send these items on to a practice email address to then be entered into your practice management software, again taking this data outside the protection of your practice.  If the device is lost or stolen, or the staff member leaves the practice without deleting all these documents, this could potentially cause a significant privacy breach for your practice and patients.

The second downside to the applications being on a staff member’s personal device is the potential erosion of work life balance for your employee.  We are all guilty of checking what that last message was, even if it is outside of office hours.  This can lead to things being missed as they were mentally checked off by the staff member checking messages out side of hours, or burn out due to extended hours looking at and thinking about work duties.

But there is always a way.  What we have suggested and implemented successfully with our clients is an office mobile device, that whilst technically mobile, should never leave your practice.  This way you can be sure of maintaining your data integrity and your staff’s work life balance.

If you want to know more about this topic or other potential practice pitfalls, contact us at Litton Andrews – admin@littonassociates.com

Pippa Steel

Senior Consultant