It’s time to assess your network and IT infrastructure. Not just because it is required for meaningful use, but because it is best practice. Ideally, this should be done once per year, and the reports submitted to the Operations Manager of the practice. It’s a great check and balance system for the IT department. Being an outsourced IT group, I appreciate it when the network is assessed, so we can make sure we have all our ducks in a row.
What exactly is involved?
When you assess your network and IT infrastructure, its not like you are looking to put the IT staff on trial. You are looking WITH the IT staff to make sure there are no holes, and that all of your processes and procedures are in place. A good assessment will look into your active directory to make sure all the users that no longer work there are disabled, password changes are made regularly, failed login attempts, user behavior history, open ports, external vulnerability and more. As for your IT infrastructure, you want to make sure you do not have any non-compliant workstations and servers, and you want to make sure any firewalls and switches have the proper firmware, and are secured from outside hackers.
Doing the assessment does not include any downtime to your practice. Tools are run in the background on one server, and it usually can take anywhere from 30 minutes to 2 hours. Its actually a very simple process, and it completely transparent to the users.
The cost?
The cost to assess your network and IT infrastructure will vary depending on the size of your practice, and the number of locations. Tier3MD has done assessments for as low as $1295, and into the many thousands for hospitals and very large practices. Tier3MD is willing to work with anyone need a assessment.
For more information, contact Tier3MD at 1-855-MYTIER3
