Healthcare cloud migration benefits and lessons learned

IT modernization is a trending topic among healthcare CIOs in today’s rapidly changing technology landscape and cloud strategy is at the top of any modernization concern. However, there is often confusion and misconceptions about the implications and value of the public cloud for health systems. Questions arise about its safety, affordability, skill and timing requirements.

In a recent webinar hosted by the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (Chime), our Chief Innovation Officer, John McDaniel, spoke with Jeremy Marut, CEO and Co-Founder of Sublimation Health and a renowned expert in Healthcare IT for more than 25 years. Talked with Experience in IT Modernization.

Jeremy shares insights from his previous role as head of digital modernization at a large New England health system. The system achieved a significant milestone by deploying Epic, along with more than 40 mission-critical integrated applications in the Amazon Web Services (AWS) public cloud, successfully terminating on-premises infrastructure.

The project was completed within 14 months, and Jeremy and his team developed a reference architecture for Epic’s future public cloud-based implementation, which serves as a model for AWS and other healthcare organizations.

5 cloud migration lessons for health systems

In this article, we present the valuable lessons learned and benefits of cloud migration for health systems, as discussed by Jeremy during the Chime webinar.

Lesson 1: Choose the right cloud provider

“Perhaps the most important step in cloud migration is choosing the right cloud provider. The chosen provider should offer native workload support, effectively handle the specific needs of your organization, provide long-term technical support as well as a transparent roadmap for future growth,” said Jeremy. He added That’s why it’s important to choose a provider with healthcare experience, ensuring a smooth migration process and superior support for your cloud system.

Keep in mind that vetting cloud providers and finalizing an agreement may require months or more than a year to ensure alignment and negotiate discounts and performance guarantees.

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Lesson 2: Be a Native

The options in the market can be confusing, but Jeremy believes that the small list of industry leaders offering core services and support (AWS, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Platform) outperform virtualization options.

“Going local is key,” Jeremy said. Non-native alternatives may not match the flexibility, scalability, automation, and scripting capabilities of the local environment. Efficient automation and systems management are additional benefits of working within the core service ecosystem of your chosen cloud provider.

Lesson 3: Foster a Cloud Mindset

“Starting the journey of modernization requires a collaborative mindset throughout the organization that creates understanding and support among all stakeholders. Building partnerships with key executive leaders and end users, from surgeons and nurses to finance departments, Migration strengthens collective commitment to strategy. Uniting everyone behind the vision enables organizations to drive wholesale change in the industry, remove barriers and drive transformative results,” said Jeremy. Your vision should extend to third party partners, he added. Tell vendors that they must move to the cloud with your organization, but that you will work closely with them to achieve success.

Lesson 4: Work Together with Financial Operations

Establishing a solid Financial Operations (FinOps) strategy is critical to reducing budgeted costs and verifying returns on your investments. The value of cloud migration partly lies in clouding off-the-shelf applications, which requires collaboration with vendors and careful monitoring. Automation, real-time monitoring and budget automation ensure effective cost control. “When FinOps is tightly integrated, organizations see increased financial efficiency and the ability to make informed decisions,” said Jeremy.

Lesson 5: Invest in cloud training and certification

Will the cloud journey require health systems to hire new and different personnel? “Not really,” said Jeremy. “In fact, the team supporting your existing infrastructure can usually be trained and certified to adapt to a cloud-first strategy. Technical skill sets in infrastructure, virtualization, and application virtualization are invaluable. Involving them from the earliest stages and investing in their cloud knowledge accelerates the learning process.

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3 Benefits of Healthcare Cloud Migration

As for the benefits organizations can realize from cloud migration, Jeremy highlighted three in particular:

Benefit 1: Return on Investment (ROI) and Cost Advantage

Addressing the continuing question of ROI, Jeremy acknowledged that the cloud demonstrated cost savings immediately. “The savings associated with our cloud migration strategy were undeniable. It was 30% cheaper than self-hosting from the start. And the ability to have unlimited computing power at any given time and the speed at which we could scale was invaluable.

Benefit 2: Efficiency and Time Saving

According to Jeremy, “the astonishing speed at which results were achieved cannot be overstated.” As an example, he cited the challenge of migrating a database of 7 million archived faxes. The task would have taken months using the health system’s previous hardware setup, he said. However, by leveraging the native automation capabilities of the cloud, his team completed the task within 72 hours at a fraction of the expected time and cost.

Benefit 3: Better Patient Outcomes

“The cloud migration brought a qualitative improvement in patient care,” Jeremy said. By freeing the IT department from mundane tasks, employees were able to focus on innovation and growth while ensuring uninterrupted services and avoiding storage shortages during critical events. The cloud also enabled a better patient experience. For example, the integration of multilingual chatbots into Epic MyChart, powered by AWS, meant immediate support, better guidance, and more personalized assistance for patients.

“Cloud migration holds tremendous potential for organizations looking to take advantage of the benefits of modern technology. Transitioning to the cloud can seem daunting, but it is critical for organizations to remain competitive and improve patient care,” said Jeremy.

Healthcare IT leaders can support your journey to the cloud. To learn more or to schedule a cloud migration assessment with one of our experts, contact us today.