Hot Topics at HIMSS ‘14

March 5, 2014

At the HIMSS Annual Conference in Orlando I spoke with many customers – physicians, hospital administrators, ancillary care providers, and IT professionals.   Konica Minolta has always provided printing solutions to the healthcare industry, and while many HIMSS attendees know about us for reliable office and production print equipment, this was an opportunity for them to see our expanded EnvisionIT Healthcare portfolio.

Since HIPAA went into effect, we have grown our healthcare offering to include industry specific software, IT services and professional services.  Today, we offer customers a complete solution of hardware, software and services that address the specific challenges in the healthcare industry such as security, document and records management, efficiency and regulatory compliance.

With roughly half of all patient data in unstructured formats such as paper documents, lab reports and referrals, healthcare providers need to efficiently and cost effectively capture, secure and integrate this information with electronic medical records (EMR) or other systems.  Konica Minolta recognized early on that combining our award-winning bizhub multifunctional printers (MFPs) that offer printing, copying and scanning from one device with workflow, authentication, EMRs, document management and capture software, provided customers with a complete solution for solving common healthcare challenges related to information management. It’s a strategy that has worked.  Customers are no longer looking for just hardware or software –they want a complete, integrated solution.

At HIMSS this year attendees were focused on:

Complying with Meaningful Use Stage 2 document transmission requirements – Now that many in the healthcare industry have adopted EMR, they need to securely share patient data across the continuum of care.  Konica Minolta addresses secure document transmission with Inofile Kno2, a cloud-based solution communicating unstructured content in a secure, standards-based approach.

Securing patient information and HIPAA – Numerous surveys announced at HIMSS indicate that customers are still concerned about document security and privacy. This is why Konica Minolta offers advanced security solutions and services that healthcare customers can use to control and manage access to sensitive data and mitigate potential breaches. Solutions such as advanced HDD encryption, device authentication, password protection, automatic data deletion and MFP activity monitoring ensure the highest level of data security.

Reducing operational costs – With costs rising, healthcare providers all expressed concerns about how to keep operational costs down without sacrificing patient care.  HIMSS attendees were very interested in solutions that improve efficiencies and minimize waste.  This can be done by driving down unnecessary printing costs, eliminating analog fax lines, streamlining workflows and business processes, and improving document management capabilities.  A great example of this is how Infirmary Health, a leading provider of healthcare in southwest Alabama, saved $240,000 with a Managed Print Solution from Konica Minolta.

Want to learn more? Watch this HIMSS TV interview or visit EnvisionIT Healthcare.

Konica Minolta

Joe Cisna manages the healthcare strategy for Konica Minolta Business Solutions and has more than 18 years of healthcare provider and payer sales and marketing experience in electronic health records and medical cost containment services. He is responsible for supporting the Direct and Dealer Sales Channels with marketing, training and sales enablement tools and initiatives to drive healthcare solutions for our customers. Joe holds an MBA and a Masters’ in Healthcare Administration and is a Certified HIPAA Professional (CHP). He loves to run and play guitar, but not at the same time.