Wave Systems Case Study – Boston Medical Center

Wave Systems EMBASSY¬ software enforces centrally managed and unrivaled data security for the hospital’s 400 laptops.

Data breaches continue to increase in every industry. But the healthcare sector has been among the hardest hit – representing almost one out of every six breaches in 2009. That ratio rose to almost one in four in 2010. And the costs are staggering. The economic impact of a single data breach is approximately $2 million, according to the Ponemon Institute.1 The total collective impact on US hospitals over two years is estimated to be $12 billion, according to the same study.

Driving these costs is the fact that federal and state regulations don’t make a practical distinction between lost and stolen data. If a laptop goes missing, healthcare providers can expect to pay stiff fines and other costs under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act. Yet, even today, many healthcare organizations have not made protecting patient data a top priority.