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Online Tech's HIPAA Compliant Cloud Provides Secure Hosting for EvalPlace

ANN ARBOR -- When Florida psychologist James Pann and his team set out to create EvalPlace, he wanted to differentiate the web-based performance management system for the health and human services fields by making it compliant with the stringent privacy and security requirements of the federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act.

That's why he chose to host the survey-building, data-collecting, performance-tracking Web site with Online Tech, the provider of HIPAA- compliant cloud hosting.

Pann, who also works as a university professor, developed EvalPlace as a customizable platform after developing many different computer programs that collect and track patient and client data for health and human services agencies. EvalPlace allows users to demonstrate the impact and effectiveness of their program or practice.

Organizations can customize the demographic variables that it tracks and a dashboard facilitates the creation and administration of surveys to be used with participants. Previously created surveys can also be found in the site's Survey MarketPlace.

Knowing that many of his potential clients in the health and human services fields would be collecting electronic personal health information (ePHI), Pann and his team built in the necessary safeguards to ensure EvalPlace met HIPAA compliance.

That meant also finding a HIPAA compliant hosting option. Pann discovered Online Tech after finding the company's HIPAA Compliant Hosting White Paper while searching online for a suitable partner. EvalPlace is now hosted on Online Tech's secure and fully managed cloud server.

In 2012, Online Tech became the first data center operator independently audited against the U.S. Office for Civil Rights HIPAA Audit Program Protocol. One year earlier, the Ann Arbor-based company was the first data center operator to be independently audited for HIPAA compliance.

"Many organizations have ePHI, but don't even realize that means they need to use sites that are HIPAA compliant," Pann said. "As I was working on this project and saw what was already out there, a big part of what distinguishes EvalPlace is HIPAA compliance and affordability."

Organizations can use the EvalPlace Web site for free for up to 25 participants. Above that the organization is charged a monthly fee, with no setup costs and the ability to terminate the service at any time.

Join Online Tech's Healthcare IT Experts at HIMSS13 in New Orleans March 4-7, 2013, hosted at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center. Our experts will be available at Booth #1369 to consult one-on-one and answer health IT questions.

Online Tech, Michigan's largest managed data center is becoming the largest in the Midwest, expanding into at least four new markets. The "Fort Knox'' for data is known for complete redundancy -- "backups for everything" -- from multiple backup generators and backup systems to locations straddling two power grids and even two CEOs.

For more information, call (877)740-5028, email contactus@onlinetech.com or visit www.onlinetech.com.

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