Modern technology is becoming the norm in the healthcare industry to bring a sense of accomplishment, performance miracles, and a place for the industry to compete along with the growing demands of increasing needy for efficiency, accuracy and improved patient outcomes. With the advent of cloud based solutions such as Health Cloud, organisations often find it difficult to grasp the differences, potential gains and wider implications of making the shift from legacy systems to this modern day solution.

In this blog, Lean IT Inc explores the Health Cloud vs. Legacy Systems debate so you can make an informed decision about your organization’s future.

A Legacy system is an outdated software or obsolete hardware, that is still in use, but may not comply to current technological standards. Because these systems have played historic roles in the management of critical data and processes, they often continue to operate.

Legacy systems in healthcare typically include:

• Their Electronic Health Records (EHR) systems built on outdated technology.
• Incompatibility with modern software, or older hardware.
• Limited scalability on ‘on premises’ solutions.
• Costly to maintain and difficult to integrate to new technology.

While these systems were revolutionary on release, they have become obsolete due to inflexible system design, lack of real time access to data and security vulnerabilities.

Health Cloud is a modern cloud delivered platform which has helped to streamline and improve healthcare operations. Health Cloud is different than legacy systems that aren’t taking advantage of the power of cloud computing in ways such as scalability, real-time data access, and better integration capabilities.

Health Cloud built on Salesforce’s health platform is created specifically for healthcare organizations such as improving patient engagement, optimizing care coordination, and delivering personalized healthcare experience.

In order to understand benefits that come from switching to Health Cloud, let’s look at the biggest differences between the two systems.

1. Scalability and Flexibility

• Legacy Systems: Not scalable; organizations need to buy expensive hardware and upgrade it when it limits capacity.
• Health Cloud: ON demand; the service grows with your organization, with low additional costs.

2. Integration

• Legacy Systems: They normally operate in silos thus making integration with other systems difficult.
• Health Cloud: It works seamlessly with all of its cloud-based counterparts for seamless succession between departments and with third party applications.

3. Data Accessibility

• Legacy Systems: Instead, data is stored on premises so that not everyone can access it.
• Health Cloud: Real time access from anywhere through cloud based data storage, increases collaboration and improves decision making.

4. Security and Compliance

• Legacy Systems: Due to outdated security protocols they are vulnerable to cyberattacks. It is difficult to maintain compliance with new regulations.
• Health Cloud: Automated scanning and encryption as well as regular updates to follow standards like HIPAA and the rest.

5. Cost Efficiency

• Legacy Systems: Heavy dependent on hardware upgrades and its support.
• Health Cloud: Reduced upfront costs (subscription pricing and reduced maintenance).

At its core, the difference lies in architecture and functionality:

• Traditional IT infrastructure and legacy systems sometimes rely on local servers as well. And both are typically rigid and heavily resource-intensive.
• Remote servers for the Cloud systems like Health Cloud provide elements of agility, scalability, and innovation over locally operated systems.

Both Health Cloud and Service Cloud are built on the Salesforce platform, but they serve distinct purposes:

• Service Cloud: Caters to customer service and support in all industries. The thing is, it’s perfect for call centers, ticket management, and customer queries.
• Health Cloud: But it is specifically designed for the healthcare sector, including features such as managing patients, coordinating their care, tracking health records.

Health Cloud is a mashup of the features of Service Cloud, plus some dedicated tools for the healthcare providers and payers.

Enhanced Patient-Centric Care

Health Cloud enables healthcare providers to move to a patient centered rather than a doctor centered approach to care. Proactive health management, 360 degree patient views and real time updates give providers the power to provide personalized experiences.

Improved Care Coordination

Care coordination is rarely efficient, however, with legacy systems, due to siloed data. Head Health Clouds holds this information central and multiple stakeholders like doctors, nurses, specialists can work seamlessly together.

Future-Ready Technology

The healthcare arena is a fast changing industry with new regulations, standards and innovations coming out all the time. The highly scalable architecture of Health Cloud ensures that your organisation is ready for the future without continually expensive infrastructure upgrades for both speed and scale.

Remaining reliant on legacy systems can hinder progress in several ways:

1. High Operational Costs: Maintaining outdated technology always has a higher cost associated with it than replacing it with new solutions.
2. Data Silos: Fragmented data leads to an inflexible system which leads to low ability to get actionable insights from data.
3. Compliance Risks: Your organization may be at risk of facing hefty penalties due to a failure to meet the current regulatory requirements, as the legacy systems do not handle everything that you need.
4. Competitive Disadvantage: It is possible that those organizations using legacy systems have a hard time competing with organizations using modern technology.

• Real-Time Data Access: Live data to make better decisions faster.
• Enhanced Interoperability: It is easy to share information across platforms.
• Predictive Analytics: It can provide a prediction as to what will happen next through AI and machine learning and to help current outcomes as well.
• Cost Optimization: Loosening your need for on-premises infrastructure reduces operating costs.

In healthcare, we help organizations transform through digital: that’s what we do at Lean IT Inc. Whether you’re transitioning from a legacy system or implementing Health Cloud for the first time, we provide:

• Customized Solutions: Designed for you and your personal objectives.
• Expert Integration: Migration to the next-generation cloud based platforms from legacy one.
• Ongoing Support: To succeed long term, training, maintenance and updates are required.

We know the many complexities of any industry and work closely with you to deliver solutions that help you run more efficiently, in compliance, and provide the best possible patient experience.

Transition from legacy systems to Health Cloud is a big jump in improving the efficiency and modernization of healthcare. Legacy systems are serving their purpose but the future lies in agile, scalable patient centric solutions like Health Cloud.

Health Cloud will allow healthcare organizations to deliver better care coordination, improve efficiency, and achieve compliance as they embrace the potential of a changing future.

However, at Lean IT Inc we’re here to guide you through this transformation. Contact us now so that we can show you how Health Cloud will transform your business and your patient results.

Engage Lean IT Inc as your partner if you want to create the future of healthcare.