Health Care and Network Essays

Submitted By lauracrltn4
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HEALTHCARE CHALLENGES mEMO

ntc/361 february 2, 2015 larry schreider

interoffice memorandum to: (aDMINISTRATION) &(mEDICAL DIRECTOR) from: subject:
HEALTH CARE CHALLENGES date: Introduction
Technology has improved and changed the way that people and organizations communicate. Health care organization requirements are becoming more complicated and require adherence to many regulations that were designed to improve patient safety, privacy of personal health information, and the overall improvement of the quality of health care for the population. Computer networks are helping to achieve these goals by having the ability to share patient files with other providers in the network and the use of protocols. A computer network does however create a risk of patient privacy being compromised because no system is completely secure but there are ways to protect against this type of information breach.
Network Infrastructure and Configurations
There are different network infrastructures available to users and each organization or user should chose the one that most suits their needs. The most commonly used network in health care is the Local Area Network (LAN), this network allows digital devices to connect to computers that are within short range, such as in the same building. There is also a network to support wireless connections within this range which is the Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN). Another network that is utilized in health care is the Wide Area Network (WAN), this networks purpose is to expand the network to cover a larger area or extend the range (Tomsho, 2011).
Network configuration is the process of setting a networks controls, flow, and operation to support the network communication of an organization and network users. A network configuration also includes network sharing, software and application installation, and firewall installation and configuration (Janssen, 2015). The most common types of configurations that are used within the healthcare organizations are the Bridged Networking and the Network Address Translation (NAT). The Bridged Networking and NAT configurations are used to transport data from the different computers in the organization and they do this by linking themselves to the network.
Challenges Healthcare Organizations are facing
When working with technology and devices there will always be some problems that will have to be worked through. While some of the problems may be rather small and insignificant, others can be very bothersome and sometimes affect an individual’s health status, such as an incorrect diagnosis. A few of the major challenges are the transferring of large files across the network and protecting healthcare data.
Transfer of large files
There are many challenges that the healthcare organizations have to deal with and the transferring of very large files is a very important issue that needs to be dealt with. Problems may be encountered when trying to transfer large files within the healthcare organization such as the time it takes for the transfer to complete. Another issue in regards to the transferring of large files is the quality of data that is transmitted. Poor quality data and images can pose a major problem when healthcare professionals are diagnosing or treating a patient.
Protecting healthcare data Data access is a factor that must be determined before any of the users in the network are allowed to even log on to and use the network. The proper personnel must first determine the type of information the different users in the organization are authorized to access and make only the information that is necessary for that user accessible. Security measures that can be used to secure data from unauthorized individuals include password encryption, two-step verification and s voice-recognition systems.
Access control can be used to