Speaker 1: listening to Health Professional Radio. My name is Wayne Bucklar and my guest today is Christina Harbridge. Now Christina is the General Manager of Ollihan IT, a Brisbane based firm. Welcome to Health Professional Radio Christina. Thank you Wayne. So Christina, Ollihan IT gives me the hint that it's IT but it doesn't tell me a whole lot else about your firm. Give me an idea

Speaker 2: of what it is you do. Well Wayne, we like to think that we specialize in information protection for healthcare professionals. So this means we specialize in IT systems as well as the security, privacy and integrity of their sensitive information.

Speaker 1: Okay. And what's your geographical footprint Christina? Is it only a Brisbane based firm

Speaker 2: or do you have a wider footprint? No, we actually look after all of Queensland and we do Victoria as well. We haven't branched out yet to the other states at the moment.

Speaker 1: Okay. So you're able to offer services in Victoria and Queensland? That's right. Now Christina, give me some sense of what it is that you do that makes you different to anyone else in this field?

Speaker 2: Well I suppose we look after healthcare professionals specifically. So we look after the GP specialist, allied health as well and dental. So we do have quite a large dental base. We are different because we look at the fact that GPs are a little bit more, I should say medical professionals, a little bit more complex in their IT requirements than some of the other organizations. And the specialty is around making sure that their data is protected. As much as they've got IT, everybody has IT. But the importance of protecting the information, that patient's information is really, really essential. And there's other things, we are very well aware of the privacy impacts and the RACGP accreditation requirements. And at the moment, the cybercrime that's actually targeting the health field for health identified information is really quite significant. It's very prevalent now. Even now, we had a couple of clients they weren't medical, but they had some ransomware a few days ago and it just grounds their business to a halt and cost them a fortune to rectify it as well. But in particular for medical, something like that can cause a breach of a patient's privacy which can be up to a $1.5 million fine for an organization. So it is really large impact on them. And the other thing that they need to consider as well is that identified health information is worth 50 times more on the black market than a credit card number. So the reason that we are a little bit different is because we understand that and we target that particular service for those practices as well as their IT.

Speaker 1: While you're listening to Health Professional Radio, I'm in conversation with Christina Harbridge from Ollihan IT. And we've just been talking about the risk that falls on medical records on the black market. And yes, I agree with you Christina. We have done stories previously about the fact that medical records are more valued on the black market than credit card details. So there is certainly an issue there for the medical profession at large to deal with.

Speaker 2: It's quite frightening actually. And the things that they can get access to so quickly. So we do really focus on that area. But it's not just about the IT security as such. It's also about the people that are working in there. They are risking themselves. So we don't just do IT, we do the consulting around training those users on using safe practices within there. And also about the privacy of the patients that are physically within the practice as well.

Speaker 1: Now Christina, about 95% of our audience are clinicians of one kind or another. What is the takeaway message for them today? What would you like them to know as a result of having had this chat?

Speaker 2: Yes. I think that the biggest thing for me is they face three real big problems and that is that they're really frustrated with their IT systems and they're not working out perfectly. And they really feel kind of overwhelmed with everything that's out there in the market for the electronic health record requirements now in Australia. And there's just so many things they need to be aware of. And they don't have the time and they don't want to spend ridiculous amounts of money on their IT systems and their security and making sure everything is safe. So those three things are really pivotal and I suppose if you get a really good IT provider that looks at that as a holistic approach to their practice, they can really have this strong fundamental system that's not just about the IT, it's about their business system and it focuses on their efficiency and their team functionality and the governance of their IT as well. So it's looking at the overall strategic picture of what their IT is doing, not just we've got a couple of computers here and we need to make sure it's secure. We're looking at the long-term goals and pictures of that for the practice. And I suppose in within that, we look at the four things and that's what I was talking about, the governance, the IT equipment, making sure it's really good quality and they've got good warranties on them and you've got a really good firewall so you've got some good security tools in place. And then obviously you want to look at your asset protection. So when I talk about asset protection, I mean backups and disaster recovery, maintaining those. And lastly, the most important thing I think that every practice should be aware of is educating their users. And anybody who comes into that or has access to the system so they need to be educated on what they're doing, how they're doing it, the best way to do things. So that's probably the four key things that I would like to have someone take away from I suppose this interview today.

Speaker 1: Yeah. Christina, in every industry there are misconceptions. What's the biggest misconception amongst your customers and clients that drives you nuts and keeps you awake at night?

Speaker 2: I actually have two. Sorry, the first one is that a security breach will never happen to me. I have this regularly. You might be a two doctor practice and we're too small for that to happen. I suppose the great example of that is that there was that breach might have been five years ago down on the Gold Coast of a GP practice. They're not that big and they lost all of their patient information. I actually have a friend who's a patient of that practice. So they lost everything. So that has put their patients all at risk. It's put them at risk. It's quite dramatic. So it doesn't matter how big you are, you're at risk. And the other one is that the IT requirements in a practice, I suppose a lot of practices that I know really think of it as an expense. It's a pain. It's just this annoying thing that they have to have. But really what I would like people to start thinking about is it's actually a tool for their business. If they don't have that IT and it's not working efficiently, then that tool then becomes an expense. But if you focus on that being a tool and making sure it's running really well and doing everything it needs to do, then it's something that's going to benefit the business.

Speaker 1: Kristina, let's hope today we can dispel some of those misconceptions amongst our audience. If you've just joined us, then you've just missed me chatting with Kristina Harbridge of Olliham IT, a Brisbane-based firm that works predominantly in Queensland and Victoria in Australia. But the good news is I have a transcript. It's on our website at www.hpr.fm. There's also a SoundCloud archive and you can find this interview on YouTube as well. Kristina, thank you for joining us today. I do appreciate your time.

Speaker 2: Great. Thank you very much, Wayne.

Speaker 1: This is Wayne Bucklar for Health Professional Radio.