Healthcare Application Management Growth Seeks Containers

April 13, 2017 - Healthcare application management solutions become more necessary as organizations build and adopt more custom applications as part of their health IT infrastructure.

Organizations across all major industries are developing individual apps to address specific internal and external functions, according to a recent Grand View Research report. Many choose to develop different app sets for each job within the organization, making managing these apps essential to the entity’s success.

App management solutions are essential to operations and to support app maintenance, optimization, support, and migration.

“As the technological adoption gains velocity in the industry, delivery models and service scopes are set to exhibit a dramatic change with software-as-a-service and cloud deployments playing a significant role in the market,” report authors stated.

Healthcare application management is a large part of mobility management strategies and also allow clinicians to treat patients more quickly by making the applications they need readily available on their preferred devices. Application management solutions also ensure that all apps are functioning properly and providing users with the correct information.

Healthcare application management solutions can help healthcare applications remain HIPAA-compliant through their entire lifecycle. App management solutions alert IT administrators to unusual activity by monitoring app operations and security protocols.

Security has always been a top healthcare mobile security concern, and with the number of healthcare mobile apps organizations are deploying rising rapidly, management solutions are more important than ever to ensure data is being accessed correctly and securely.

Healthcare organizations are beginning to embrace bolder strategies when it comes to application management. Containers-as-a-service (CaaS) are being used more often to manage containers and healthcare applications.

A recent Research and Markets report estimates that the CaaS market will grow at a CAGR of 34 percent through 2023.

The transition to hybrid cloud, faster and more flexible deployment, and cost savings are the main driving factors for CaaS adoption across all major industries, according to report authors. Increased adoption over the next five years will drive vendors to develop better and more effective tools.

Healthcare organizations are gaining interest in containers as more mobile apps are being built and deployed for workflow operations and mobile initiatives. Containers are more secure by design than several other mobile deployment options, which makes them appealing for HIPAA compliance and protecting patient information.

Containers provide naturally increased security by separating data. Containers access PHI by clearance level or department protects data in other containers. While the data in the breached container is still compromised, the other containers are virtually separated and unaware of each other, making cross-penetration impossible.  

Organizations are using containers more often to build, deploy, and manage apps. Containers also enable digital transformation because they increase IT infrastructure density.

Container management solutions are constantly being developed. Earlier this week, Skytap announced the release of Skytap Container Management, which will allow organizations to develop, deploy, and run traditional enterprise and containerized applications together in the Skytap cloud.

Skytap developed its application management tool to accelerate application modernization in the wake of rapid IT infrastructure digitization.

“This transformation requires enterprises to evolve IT infrastructure, processes, and architecture,” Skytap said in a statement. “Organizations in every industry need to replace legacy hardware with cloud resources, implement agile and DevOps processes, and adopt new application architectures, including containers. Executing this transition enables faster, safer, and more efficient software delivery, which is the cornerstone of on-demand digital services that customers expect.”

 Skytap’s solution takes enterprise applications that are locked in the datacenter and moves them to containers in the cloud.

Organizations need healthcare application management solutions that are not only secure, but also flexible enough to adapt to future app development initiatives.