For medical professionals to take care of patients, they need to be able to trust that their technology is secure and efficient. IT at any healthcare facility must troubleshoot issues quickly, without impacting appointments. At organizations like Compass Healthcare, Intel vPro® technology has become essential to ensuring that the needs of a wide range of health specialists are met, without compromising on cost or security.
Compass Healthcare is dedicated to providing advanced care to patients across central Michigan. As a multi-specialty medical group, Compass is comprised of 14 independent health offices, ranging from dermatology to cancer care to neurosurgery. Every office has its own unique culture and capabilities—which means that it also has its own budget and demand for technology.
Challenge
Carl Seabold, the director of IT and security officer for Compass Healthcare, is responsible for all of the equipment that goes out to healthcare specialists. Due to the structure of his organization, nearly every device that leaves his office is unique. Radiologists require laptops with different specs than the dermatologists or general care doctors. He can’t simply image devices like most organizations can, so it’s important that Seabold and his team have a unified platform that allows them to provision different devices quickly and manage them remotely.
Solution
In 2019, Seabold and his team undertook an initiative to adopt remote monitoring and management for devices powered by Intel vPro® Enterprise. They worked closely with Intel to set up a server for Intel® Endpoint Management Assistant (Intel® EMA). The Intel support staff guided Compass Healthcare through the process of activating a line of laptops with the server for the first time, even through obstacles like Wi-Fi drivers that were not connecting properly.
Active Intel vPro platform-based devices now make up about half of the Compass Healthcare fleet, and Seabold’s team continues to push toward Intel on every device as laptops get refreshed and replaced. With the Intel vPro platform, Compass Healthcare adopted Intel® Active Management Technology (Intel® AMT) powerful management tools. These modern manageability solutions connect Seabold’s team directly to the hardware in user devices, so they can remotely discover, repair, and protect PCs across the organization.
Results
Since deploying Intel solutions, Compass Healthcare has seen a streamlined provisioning and troubleshooting process. Now preparing a laptop for a healthcare professional—including activating it on the Intel EMA server—takes an IT technician mere minutes. Once a device is out the door, healthcare professionals are able to work more reliably. Seabold’s team can troubleshoot issues remotely, and helpdesk ticket response time has dropped significantly with the use of the Intel vPro platform.
An added benefit of the Intel vPro platform is that it streamlines HIPAA compliance and reporting. Intel vPro technology adds an essential layer of protection below the OS, so Seabold can trust that devices across all offices are more safe. When it comes time to report protections for HIPAA audits, Intel EMA makes it easy to export necessary details on every active device. With the help of Intel, users at Compass Healthcare are better protected, and the IT staff is more efficient.
“Intel vPro has dramatically helped us save time as a tech team.”
Deploying Devices for Every Office and Every Need
A physician-led organization means that each healthcare provider can establish the resources they need to best help their patients, and they make technology requests based on those needs. For the IT department, though, that means working with different practices is almost like working for a series of independent small businesses.
“All of the offices are individual, unique offices. They all have their own approval and purchase power, so there’s no real central budget for IT,” says Seabold. “We can’t really do any imaging or any network-wide push of the same image, so we do a lot of manual deployment.”
Each request for a laptop refresh or a new employee PC is a distinct task, so Seabold and his team take advantage of solutions to speed up the process without compromising quality. The Intel vPro platform is essential to help provision new devices, whether it’s for a nurse working in orthopedics or a doctor specializing in pulmonary medicine.
“Now, in 2022, our deployment times are incredibly short due to vPro,” says Seabold. “Many of my techs can handle getting things prepped for any of the offices in mere minutes.”
Devices powered by Intel vPro Enterprise come with Intel EMA and Intel AMT to optimize management. For Compass Healthcare, users are dispersed across central Michigan, and these powerful tools allow Seabold and his team to access devices remotely without third-party software or additional costs. Activating user devices with Intel EMA only takes minutes, and it ensures easy management long-term. The remote monitoring and management tools connect to devices under the OS layer, so it provides reliable access without disrupting patient care.
Built-In Protections Fit for Healthcare Organizations
Healthcare organizations all handle sensitive patient data, so security is of the utmost importance. Seabold first considered deploying powerful Intel technologies at Compass Healthcare when a previous remote management tool experienced a breach. The organization needed remote tools to manage equipment across over a dozen different sites, but they absolutely could not compromise on security.
“We have the regulations dealing with the healthcare market that we have to follow, and we take security seriously,” says Seabold. “We need to ensure all of our healthcare providers are protected while working efficiently from anywhere.”
Intel vPro Enterprise is a platform that Compass Healthcare knows they can rely on. Not only does the technology provide secure remote management tools, but the Intel® Hardware Shield delivers integrated hardware-based protection on every PC. Even though the organization is dispersed across many locations, Seabold can trust that users are protected by the Intel vPro platform with an essential layer of security below the OS.
“In some places, techs only visit the office once a quarter. We have to trust that these offices are secure, and then we have to trust that the machines are secure,” says Seabold.
“Intel vPro is integral for us to trust that these machines are secure and running properly.”
Not only does the platform protect users, but it also helps the IT team regularly double check all of their protections. As a healthcare organization, Compass needs to report their security measures and HIPAA compliance once a year. The Intel vPro platform gives Seabold visibility into the protections on every device, and it streamlines the reporting process.
“Intel vPro has really helped us deal with HIPAA audits,” says Seabold. “It has made it easier to say with certainty that we are secure and we have the tools necessary to pass the audit.” Reporting on the organization’s antivirus software, hardware-based protections, firewalls, and other security measures is easy to export and compile with the right paperwork. With Intel vPro, Seabold and his team feel secure and prepared.
An Unrivaled Business PC Platform
The Intel vPro platform is built for IT heroes, powered by the latest Intel® Core™ processors. It delivers the highest performance and most comprehensive hardware-based security. These professional-grade technologies help prepare your business for the future by providing users the remarkable responsiveness they want and IT the manageability they need.
Benefits that Reach Across the Organization
While the Intel vPro platform helps ensure IT efficiency, the platform also delivers what users want. Professional-grade performance ensures that employees equipped with the Intel vPro platform are able to run whatever software they need to do their job effectively. The high-performance workstations deliver unrelenting reliability, but even if a user does encounter an issue that needs troubleshooting, IT techs are often able to fix the issue without disruption.
“Our techs are able to get into all of these machines, regardless of where they’re at, and troubleshoot every level of trouble that gets reported,” says Seabold. “We can go to them digitally and work on things to make their life more efficient and let them get back to helping patients.”
As IT spends less time troubleshooting issues or traveling to locations to help users, they are able to spend more time on strategic initiatives that help the whole organization. Between the efficient use of IT resources and the money saved on software, Seabold can see how Intel vPro platform is improving the bottom line. Seabold can see the solution saving any organization money.
“In the future, I see many more organizations moving towards it just for cost savings, and then they’ll probably realize that they’re doing things much more effectively or efficiently because their IT teams will be able to do all this work remotely without any additional tools.”
Ultimately, implementing the Intel vPro platform was a strategic decision meant to help Compass Healthcare long-term. It is a powerful tool that can deliver what users want and what the IT team needs, all while helping to reduce costs. It is the perfect platform to support a wide range of devices and operating systems at the multifaceted medical group so that employees have the tools they need to focus on patient care.
“vPro has dramatically helped us save time and stress as a tech team. It has improved our employees’ ability to get work done, and it’s going to save us a good amount of money,” says Seabold. “I would absolutely recommend Intel vPro, and I already have many times.”