American Hospice, a leader in the delivery of hospice services, urgently needed a way to secure its new mobile health initiative, allowing for the transi-tion of its antiquated, paper-based records system online. The organiza-tion’s new, cutting-edge mobile system that would eliminate its complicated paper-based reporting for traveling staff, improve patient care and meet new Medicare record filing require-ments was at a standstill. In order to meet the data-in-motion security man-date from HIPAA, American Hospice needed virtual private network (VPN) to rollout the mobile health initiative —or otherwise risk having to redesign the entire system.

PUSHING FOR A MOBILE SOLUTIONAmerican Hospice had a growing paper problem. The organization’s 180 home healthcare workforce were logging home visits across five states, tracking mileage, and updating checklists for more than 1,500 patients manually, all through a paper-based process. Adding another layer of pain, new Medicare regulations started requiring patient claims to be filed within a shorter win-dow of time—one they were not able to meet. The existing processes were also weighing down the organization’s cash flows by delaying Medicare reimburse-ments. It was, unquestionably, time to rethink their approach.

“We had the health aid workers coming into the office to turn in their paper-work,” explains Fred Cruz, IT director at American Hospice. “It took our office staff several days to enter the reams of loose paper into our systems. Once entered, the team needed to submit the information to Medicare. The main questions were: are we able to meet their tight window, yet be accurate in our recordkeeping and make sure we are reimbursed in a timely manner? The answer was no and it began to impact our bottom line.”

Not only did this mire the organization in bogs of paperwork, it also caused a slew of accounting and time-loss issues. Ultimately, the organization opted to invest in home health tracking software and mobile devices to allow hospice workers direct access to the network. With this process, they could eliminate all the paperwork and keep the main office updated in near real-time.

ADDRESSING THE DATA IN MOTION ISSUEThe more daunting challenge, however, turned out to be finding a VPN system that was compatible with their unique needs and able to scale as needed for future demands. Securing data in motion is not only a requirement for HIPAA, American Hospice puts a premium on protecting sensitive patient information as well as their own IT system integrity.

A complex mesh of technology flourished in American Hospice’s networking environment, including a variety of firewalls, network gateways and endpoints. The new mobile health initiative added further complexity by introducing several Windows Mobile-based devices. Due to the nature of the remote network access needs, any system had to provide both IPsec and SSL VPN. A single system that could handle this without disruption or a rip-replace strategy was essential.

“Once we decided to make the transi-tion, we spent months finding the right VPN solution, which turned out to be the hardest part,” Cruz recalls. “We sifted through price issues, interoper-ability questions, system management concerns, and stressed that whichever system we chose must be as easy as possible for our non-technical staff to use while meeting our strict security requirements.”

After sifting through a huge variety of VPN solutions, American Hospice found that many vendors were fly-by-night companies that had gone out of business or simply offered over-hyped solutions that didn’t work as advertised.

AMERICAN HOSPICE SALVAGES MOBILE HEALTH INITIATIVE WITH NCP’S HELP

WE WEREDESPERATELYIN NEED OFA SOLUTIONAND NCPSAVED US”

Fred Cruz, Director of ITAmerican Hospice

CASE STUDY

When Cruz’s former colleague learned about American Hospice’s struggles, he immediately recommended NCP engineering.

“We knew right away that NCP was the answer to our problems,” Cruz says. “NCP has been around for more than 25 years and is known for having compatible, end-to-end, easy-to-use software solution for problems exactly like ours. They had the experience, expertise, and the products we needed. We were desperately in need of a solu-tion and NCP saved us.”

SOLVING THE CHALLENGEAmerican Hospice selected the NCP Secure Enterprise Solution to protect patient data reported by its 180 home healthcare employees. The NCP Secure Enterprise Solution secures all of the information on the devices themselves and while in transit to the hospice’s net-work, a key HIPAA requirement. With the solution, the organization was also able to significantly reduce its operation costs and increase worker productivity.

Cruz points out, “now we can bill accurately immediately and we have improved our cash flows significantly. Our claims are now updated in almost real-time from our staff on the road, so we don’t have to suffer through rounds and rounds of corrections. “

When the NCP Secure Enterprise Solution was rolled out in May 2010, the deployment was so seamless that it took only three days—exceeding American Hospice’s allotted five-day expectation. The home health staff can now safely schedule home visits, log

travel mileage and provide patient status updates in near real-time. The accounting team can also file Medicare claims with up-to-date information, eliminating expensive and cumbersome file corrections.

The organization’s 180 home healthcare employees now use NCP’s one-click VPN client to synchronize and securely transmit patient data from their Windows Mobile-based devices to the hospice’s server. The NCP Secure Enterprise Management System also provides American Hospice’s IT staff with a single point of administration for the hospice management company’s entire VPN network, as well as practical network access control (NAC) functions, and management. Network administra-tors can easily control user and device provisioning, and distribute plug-in updates and configuration settings.

“We were extremely impressed with the company’s technology and support during the deployment phase,” says American Hospice’s Cruz. “The stability to ensure a secure communications environment for our healthcare staff has become a cornerstone of our mis-sion to provide the highest quality care to our patients and their families.”

For additional information on the way NCP engineering enables its customers to rethink remote access with its “Next Generation Network Access Technology,” visit http://www.ncp-e.com/en/solutions/rethink-remote-access.html.

About American HospiceFounded in 1992, American Hospice is oldest hospice management company in the U.S., and one of the five larg-est hospice companies in the country. Headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida, the company has hospices in Arizona, Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Maryland, Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia, Georgia, and Wisconsin.

For more information about American Hospice, please visit www.americanhospice.com.

About NCP engineering, Inc. Since its inception in 1986, NCP engineering has delivered innovative software that allows enterprises to rethink their secure remote access, and overcome the complexities of creat-ing, managing and maintaining network access for staff.

Headquartered in the San Francisco Bay Area, the company serves 30,000-plus customers worldwide throughout the healthcare, financial, education and government markets, as well as many Fortune 500 companies. NCP has established a network of national and regional technology, channel and OEM partners to serve its customers. To learn more about NCP engineering, visit www.ncp-e.com. Reach the company on its blog, VPN Haus, or on Twitter.

NCP engineering, Inc.444 Castro Street, Suite 711Mountain View, CA 94041

Phone: +1 (650) 316-6273Fax: +1 (650) 251-4155www.ncp-e.com

WE WEREEXTREMELYIMPRESSED WITH THE COMPANY’S TECHNOLOGY”

“

Fred Cruz, Director of ITAmerican Hospice

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