BRENTWOOD, Tenn., May 24, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Cyberattacks targeting hospitals and healthcare organizations have surged during the COVID-19 pandemic, jeopardizing care delivery, patient outcomes and financial resources. IBM Security's 2021 Cost of a Data Breach Report found healthcare organizations incur the highest average breach costs at $9.23 million and take an average of 93 days to mitigate resulting damage.

"While cyberattacks are inevitable, hospitals are especially vulnerable and continue to be disproportionately targeted," said Jeff Adams, SVP, Technology, QHR Health. "The best defense begins with a proactive investment in cybersecurity and a strategic plan to identify and respond to threats."

In a recent article, QHR Health, a leading shared service solutions provider strengthening independent, community healthcare, shared seven practices to prepare for cyberattacks and mitigate damage, including:

• Know your environment. 
  An in-depth understanding of the environment is essential as the broad attack surfaces of hospitals are an easy target for cybercriminals to expose and exploit vulnerabilities.

• Develop, test and periodically review your complete disaster recovery plan. 
  For hospitals, a comprehensive disaster recovery plan ensures recovery of patient data, restoration of critical applications and continuity of operations in the event of an attack.

• Adopt robust multi-factor authentication. 
  Implementation of additional verification factors beyond usernames and passwords protects resources against increasingly sophisticated cyberattacks.

To read the article, Cyberattacks Are Inevitable: 7 Hospital Practices to Get Ready, click here.

About QHR Health

At QHR Health, our focus is strengthening independent community healthcare. For more than 40 years, QHR Health has collaborated with independent hospitals and health systems to ensure that people in communities ranging from small towns to larger population centers, have local access to quality healthcare services. Through our portfolio of tech-enabled shared services, QHR Health helps independent hospitals outperform their peers in financial, operational and quality metrics through leverage and economies of scale. To learn how, visit QHR.com (https://qhr.com) or connect with us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

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SOURCE QHR Health