IT security as the foundation of healthcare
ATOS creates a secure, central infrastructure with SD-WAN and RIEDEL Networks
IT is the backbone of every organization. This is especially true in medicine, where mistakes can be costly. As a provider of high quality healthcare services, it is essential for us to secure this backbone by minimizing security risks and protecting our data and productivity. In a distributed IT landscape, this task is more challenging and can pose problems for IT departments, organizations and our customers.
In this case, the solution lies in meshing and optimizing the network infrastructure.
Optimizing a network means significantly increasing group-wide security standards, ensuring better internal and external communication while maintaining a balance between complexity and simplicity. And even if security, speed and reliability of the infrastructure are paramount when storing, sharing and processing patient data, this infrastructure should also be easy to manage.
When I joined ATOS Kliniken in 2019, we were just starting to restructure our network and our entire IT architecture model.
Rethinking Our Infrastructure and Enacting a Digital Transformation
ATOS was founded in 1991 and today operates 10 clinics and 25 medical care centers at several locations in Germany. We specialize in orthopaedic surgery and perform more than 19,000 orthopaedic treatments per year. The hotel-style clinics and post-operative care reflect our conviction that a pleasant environment and human attention support the healing process. It is important to us to provide our patients with the best possible care - and that includes good IT.
The first step was to solve some fundamental problems. Our WAN was slow, outdated and poorly connected. We were dependent on several providers and had no consistent service or technology standards. We also lacked a centralized support team. The level of IT security varied from site to site and staff were often at a loss when problems arose due to our heterogeneous network technology. The setup was inefficient and led to enormous organizational burdens.
"A pleasant environment and human warmth supports the healing process. It is important to offer patients the very best service possible—and that goes all the way down to IT."
Initially, we ensured that all IT tasks were centralized in one department. As Chief Information Officer, I am responsible for implementing our IT strategy: driving digital transformation, standardizing IT solutions across the Group, improving internal and external communication and strengthening cyber security to protect patient data. In order to build a centrally designed IT architecture model, it was necessary to find new approaches for our infrastructure and its procurement.
We found the perfect partner
Together with our security partner, we put this project out to tender. When reviewing the bids, we noticed a smaller company with impeccable references that offered a functional solution at a suitable price. That company was RIEDEL Networks.
RIEDEL Networks is a privately owned global network provider. Their SDN backbone spans Germany and the world, and their technicians are true experts in modern IT security. RIEDEL combines the agility of a small company with the product range of its larger competitors. In addition, RIEDEL is present at all our locations, so we benefit from personal support as well as technical expertise.
"Relying on fewer vendors saves valuable time and resources, and improves the ability to react quickly when something goes wrong."
For us, modernizing our systems for greater security, stability and agility went hand in hand with a reduction in the number of partners. With fewer providers, there are also fewer points of contact when deploying and managing the infrastructure. This saves valuable time and resources and allows us to act more quickly if something goes wrong. This minimizes interruptions and downtime that can impact patient care.
Switching to RIEDEL means that we no longer have to deal with countless providers in the event of errors and problems, but have a single point of contact. The result? Faster response times and increased reliability. At the same time, we have more control over costs and pay less overall because a single service agreement covers hardware, bandwidth and support.
The decision in favor of RIEDEL's offer and the associated switch to a managed SD-WAN solution have fundamentally changed the entire IT network management at ATOS Kliniken.
A new network based on secure Cisco technology
The basis of RIEDEL's new network design is Cisco SD-WAN technology, which went live in the first clinic in October 2022. In the meantime, 20 of our 30 locations are running Cisco SD-WAN, and deployment is currently underway at the remaining locations.
A key selling point was the Cisco SD-WAN vManage Dashboard. It is used to automate network management and offers comprehensive network transparency. The vManage Dashboard gives my team complete control over our entire infrastructure. Among other things, we will be able to monitor connection speeds and detect performance vulnerabilities. We can also use detailed security statistics to prevent digital attacks and isolate parts of the network in case malware does get in. The dashboard serves as a front line of defense where any potential problem is detected and reported to RIEDEL and to us. With this solution, our IT team will be able to handle simpler management tasks themselves, while more complex issues will be passed directly to RIEDEL.
RIEDEL also had the right solution for another urgent security problem, namely the management of our endpoints, with the Cisco AnyConnect Secure Mobility Client. Previously, our clinics used very different VPN solutions to connect to the MLPS WAN, the settings and updates of which presented our IT department with major difficulties. Today, we have a complete overview of endpoint security so that our users are guaranteed to be protected and secure, regardless of which end device they use.
Together with the Cisco Umbrella cloud-based security application, we can monitor network traffic and prevent malicious intrusions and attacks at the IP and DNS level. Instead of relying on internet devices and other hardware-level protections, we now benefit from flexible security with consistent rules across all our sites that protect remote users accessing our network with their own devices.
Another benefit of working with RIEDEL and using Cisco SD-WAN, Umbrella and AnyConnect is easier security audits. As a medical service provider, we are subject to annual security audits to demonstrate compliance with German regulations. The Cisco infrastructure and security tools make it much easier for us to gather the required information on our IT security measures. If our audits show that we only rely on two providers for our IT security instead of a long list of different service providers, this not only makes a good impression on investors and regulators, but also shows that we have our cyber security under control.
Clearing the Digital Transformation Hurdle
I am completely satisfied with the progress of our projects and am already looking forward to all our locations being connected to the Cisco SD-WAN by the end of 2023. Once the implementation is complete, I will be looking for new SaaS applications, IT products and platforms that will allow us to further improve the patient experience in our clinics based on our new infrastructure.
By setting up the Cisco SD-WAN, we have cleared the first major hurdle on the path to digital transformation. Our clinics will then be able to use a fully managed, secure, powerful and fast network that is managed and controlled from a central data center. This means that ATOS is ideally equipped for further expansion projects. In addition, the new network architecture allows the easy integration of further cloud-based medical and operational SaaS applications, as we are no longer bound by the physical capacity limits of a local infrastructure.
RIEDEL has proven to be an excellent partner and the decision to use a managed network was the right one in every respect.
