Nextcloud in
Healthcare

Protocols, status updates and test results can be stored safely and shared easily among the professionals who need access.
With the growing complexity of the medical profession comes increasing amounts of patient data. Having patient information available in a moments notice can save lives. Nextcloud is designed for ease of use, fitting familiar interfaces and lowering the barrier to sharing and data access.

Easy access

A first requirement for any secure solution to share data is that it does not force complexity on the user. Complexity leads to mistakes and mistakes can cost lives!
Nextcloud makes accessing and sharing data a breeze, providing users a comfortable, familiar workspace.

Multi-platform productivity

Data needs to be available where the patient is. Tablets, mobile devices, laptops and desktops all have access to the same files at a moments notice thanks to the first-class Nextcloud clients.
Doctors and nurses can tag and comment on files for easy collaboration, roll back files to earlier versions or find deleted files in the trash. Real time collaborative editing and secure audio/video calls and chat complement the array of features aimed at enhancing productivity.

While data needs to be at medical professionals’ finger tips at all times, the IT department must be able to ensure policies around Protected Health Information are respected.
Healthcare data is at the same time extremely sensitive and needs to be immediately accessible. Regulators are aware and privacy and security requirements are extremely strict with HIPAA and HITECH rules in the US matched in many other countries across the globe.
Nextcloud is a popular self-hosted solution in healthcare for its ability to strictly control access to data and industry-leading security capabilities.

File Access Control

The File Access Control feature of Nextcloud enables IT to codify legal and policy requirements, blocking unauthorized users uploading or downloading data following defined rules. Criteria include IP address ranges, group membership, file type and size, time and more. Data retention can be controlled as well, enabling administrators to limit the lifetime of certain files.

Monitoring and auditing logs

Nextcloud offers built-in powerful monitoring capabilities, enabling institutions to ensure smooth performance. Systems can be monitored using the web interface or through monitoring and systems intelligence tools like OpenNMS, Splunk, Nagios or others. A full auditing system logs all user actions, enabling fully compliant usage of file sync and share.

Encryption

Nextcloud uses industry-standard SSL/TLS encryption for data in transfer. Data at rest in storage can be encrypted using a default military grade AES-256 encryption with server-based or custom key management. Optionally and on a per-folder base data can be end-to-end encrypted on the client with the server assisting in sharing and key management using a Zero-Knowledge model.
Seamless integration and ease of use with key features like offline recovery keys, auditing and HSM support make Nextcloud Encryption capabilities leading in the industry.

Complexity is the enemy of security and Nextcloud is designed to offer quick and easy integration in existing infrastructure, leaving policies and procedures in place. Its powerful LDAP and storage integration seamlessly fits with existing user directories, Windows Network Drive, NFS and Sharepoint storage solutions.
The result: a quick implementation at low cost, and easy maintenance making a self-hosted Nextcloud the cloud compliance solution with the lowest TCO.