Colorado Health Information Exchange Provides Data Caregivers Need to Improve Patient Care with Aid from Veeam and NewCloud

The Business Challenge

CORHIO created one of the largest and most successful networks for health information exchange in the United States.

Nearly 14,000 health care organizations participate in the network including hospitals, doctors’ offices, long-term care facilities, labs and imaging centers. CORHIO’s network gives them access to accurate, up-to-date patient information so they can provide appropriate care.

“Our network is comprised of 80 million clinical records for 5.4 million patients,” said Robert Denson, Chief Information Officer at CORHIO. “That’s 52 terabytes of data, and it’s growing fast—by more than 20 terabytes each year. Unlike most organizations, we don’t delete data after a certain period of time. We keep it forever because health care providers need access to family medical histories when treating the next generation.”

CORHIO’s challenge was keeping enormous quantities of data available.

“Our sole purpose is to deliver the right health information to the right place at the right time,” Denson said. “None of that is possible if data isn’t available. If someone is brought to the emergency room and can only tell doctors and nurses her name, the first thing they’ll do is check our network for her health data. If it’s not available because of a server glitch, they have no way of knowing important information: What medications does she take? Does she have a pre-existing condition like diabetes?

To ensure the security of their data, CORHIO contacted NewCloud Networks, a global cloud services provider.

“CORHIO is in the business of exchanging clinical information, not maintaining an IT infrastructure,” said Sam Kumar, Founder and CEO of NewCloud. “We knew what type of cloud solution they needed, and Veeam is at the center of it.”

The Veeam Solution

NewCloud designed a customized cloud solution for CORHIO featuring Veeam Availability Suite.

“Veeam and NewCloud help us make health information available instantly to medical providers so they can offer patients the best care and treatment,” Denson said. “Veeam and NewCloud also help us preserve patient’s privacy.”

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) mandates the protection and confidentiality of patient information. NewCloud’s HIPAA-compliant cloud and Veeam’s monitoring, reporting, testing and documentation are the perfect fit for CORHIO.

NewCloud and Veeam have something else in common: NetApp®.

“Our cloud platform is built on the best, most reliable data center foundations in the world, including NetApp ONTAP®, FAS and AFF,” Kumar said. “The integration between NetApp and Veeam is one of the reasons we’re able to offer customers fast, reliable backup as a service (BaaS), disaster recovery as a service (DRaaS) and security as a service (SECaaS).”

Denson said these services give CORHIO the confidence to take on new projects. One project is with the State of Colorado Division of Youth Services.

“The state’s 10 medical centers for at-risk youth wanted to improve the care they provide, so they asked for our help,” Denson said. “They were having trouble gathering kids’ health histories because many don’t have parents to keep track of that information. We helped the medical centers become part of our network, and now they have accurate data about each child, enabling them to provide the right care for healthy futures.”

Denson said one of CORHIO’s favorite sayings is “health care moves at the speed of trust.”

“Without trusted partners like NewCloud and Veeam, we wouldn’t be able to empower people, providers and communities, enabling healthy outcomes for millions of people.”

The Results

• Maintains availability of 80 million clinical records
  Health care providers throughout Colorado depend on CORHIO’s network for instant access to medical records. This information helps them provide better care, and in some cases, save lives.
• Supports healthy outcomes for 5.4 million patients
  “Our partnership with NewCloud and Veeam is key to our success,” Denson said. “NewCloud built us a customized cloud service to protect patient data, and Veeam is the engine driving data availability.”
• Improves medical care for Colorado’s at-risk youth
  “One of our core values is building community through collaboration,” Denson said. “Veeam and NewCloud helped us do exactly that with at-risk youth.”