CalvertHealth, a health system in rural southern Maryland, has undergone significant changes over the past century to keep up with the growing needs of the community it serves. The health system, which celebrated its centennial in 2019, has evolved from a single two-story building into multiple modern facilities and has become a major private employer in Calvert County.
Melissa Hall, who recently became CalvertHealth’s Chief Nursing Officer and Vice President of Clinical Services, has been with the organization for several years in various roles, including Manager of Clinical Informatics and CIO. Her experience has given her a unique perspective on the role of technology in healthcare delivery.
“The strategy isn’t that much different,” she says. “As a nurse, I just want the systems to work. The IT side of me wants them to come back up quickly.”
Several years ago, Hall led the implementation of a tape-based, on-premises backup for CalvertHealth’s MEDITECH electronic health records system. While this was an important step in safeguarding patient data, it still took up to 72 hours to restore critical clinical systems in the event of a cyberattack. With limited budgets and competing priorities, upgrading the system seemed too expensive for the rural health system.
However, CalvertHealth leaders recognized the need to improve their EHR recovery site and migrated to Amazon Web Services. This upgrade significantly reduced recovery time from 72 hours to just two to four hours. The health system has also conducted two failover tests without anyone noticing.
Hall emphasized that this move was a no-brainer for her. She knew that as a stand-alone, rural-based organization, CalvertHealth could not afford to face a cyberattack that could potentially shut down critical clinical systems. The driving factor behind the upgrade was the need to ensure that patient care could still be delivered in case of such an incident.
“To me, it was a no-brainer. I thought, ‘If we don’t do it now, we won’t get to do it again.’ As a stand-alone, rural-based organization, we couldn’t achieve this on our own,” she says. “It was a huge win for us, and the driving piece of it was ensuring that we can deliver patient care.”
Smaller rural hospitals across the United States have been facing financial hardships and staffing shortages, with over 135 rural hospitals closing between 2010 and 2021, according to the American Hospital Association. As a result, these hospitals are vulnerable to cyberattacks, which have hit an all-time high in 2021. While cybersecurity investments are imperative, Fitch Ratings warns that they are likely to be low priority for health systems focused on cost containment.
Despite these concerns, rural health systems such as CalvertHealth must remain capable of responding to medical emergencies and serving their communities. Natalie Schibell, Vice President and Research Director at Forrester, emphasized that organizations must consider the impact of cyberattacks on top of everything else. In a worst-case scenario, a single click can shut down an entire hospital, highlighting the critical importance of cybersecurity investments for rural health systems.
“Organizations have to consider the impact of cyberattacks on top of everything else,” she says. “If the economy doesn’t take them out, a cyberattack will. One click can shut down an entire hospital.”
