Tidewell Hospice Secures Patient Data on Mobile Devices with MobileIron

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., May 30, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- MobileIron, a leader in security and management for mobile apps, documents, and devices, announced that it has been selected by Tidewell Hospice to provide the Mobile IT foundation for Tidewell's mobility initiatives.

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20120920/MM78751LOGO)

Serving more than 1,000 patients daily in the Florida counties of Sarasota, Manatee, Charlotte and DeSoto, Tidewell is one of the largest not-for-profit hospices in the U.S. Home-based palliative care is the basic premise of the program, involving the support of physicians, registered nurses, social service counselors, certified nursing assistants and volunteers, all following a prescribed plan of care.

Mobile is Indispensable
For Tidewell, mobile devices are an essential tool. The organization cares for more than 8,000 patients each year; the vast majority still living in their homes. Tidewell's nurses and social workers spend their days visiting their patients in a variety of locations and mobile devices are indispensable. Tidewell also needs to enable its business development team that proactively meets with health care organizations and physician's offices that are potential sources of patient referrals. These associates need to be able to quickly communicate in a very small window of time, and Tidewell has found that tablets are a quick and easy way to show educational videos and present collateral rather than wasting the time of a busy physician in booting up a laptop and connecting to a VPN.

Support for a Broad Range of Devices and HIPAA Compliance
Tidewell had two primary requirements for a Mobile IT platform: the diversity of device support and HIPAA compliance. "Even though we provide BlackBerrys, we've found that many of our health care workers and physicians want to use their own devices," said David Lafferty, CIO, Tidewell Hospice. "I knew I needed to secure mobile devices and I wanted to provide an added capability for appropriate employees. I didn't want to bring a new physician on board and say you have to use a BlackBerry when they are so accustomed to their iPhone." Tidewell also needed to be certain that it could remotely wipe and/or lock any device to ensure HIPAA compliance.

In researching vendor options, Tidewell found that MobileIron offers the security features it needs, as well as the breadth of device support that fits with how the organization wants to enable a Bring Your Own Device program.

Recognizing Significant Cost Savings Through BYOD
Tidewell hopes to expand a BYOD program for its employees in the future. In so doing, it could potentially see its per-user mobile device cost drop from $80 per month for corporate- owned devices to just over $80 per year by simply licensing MobileIron for the employees who choose to use their personal device. 

Moving Forward with Mobile Apps
Having solved the challenges of device security and support for both corporate- and employee-owned devices, Tidewell is starting to embrace mobile apps to improve patient care, and recently completed its first pilot of an app that facilitates scheduling patient visits for its triage nurses.

The GPS-enabled app connects the Tidewell call center and night triage nurses. When an emergency call comes in from a patient, the call center dispatcher can look at a map, see which night nurse is the closest, and then dispatch that nurse to the patient. At the same time, the nurse is able to push a button on his or her device to view identifiable information about the patient, such as, whether or not the patient is experiencing pain or has any medication issues. The result is that response time is faster and the nurse has the information required to provide the best level of patient care.

"We had the confidence to deploy this app because of the granular controls that MobileIron provides," Lafferty said. "Based on the success of the pilot program, we are now moving to full production."

About MobileIron
The leader in security and management for mobile apps, documents, and devices, MobileIron's mission is to enable global companies to become Mobile First organizations, embracing mobility as their primary IT platform in order to transform their businesses and increase their competitiveness. Recognized by IDC as the fastest growing mobile enterprise management vendor in the world, MobileIron provides the scalable architecture, rapid innovation, and best practices for global companies to transform into Mobile First organizations. Leading global companies use MobileIron as the foundation for their Mobile First initiatives, including 8 of the top 10 automotive manufacturers, 7 of the top 10 pharmaceutical companies, 5 of the top 10 banks, 5 of the top 10 law firms, and 4 of the top 10 retailers. For more information, please visit www.mobileiron.com.

SOURCE MobileIron