Providing healthcare organizations with quality managed services

The challenge

Reliable, secure, high-quality IT services required to safeguard non-profit clients’ protected data 

With many of its clients in the highly regulated healthcare space, BRIDGE Healthcare Partners requires a dependable, secure environment to ensure the availability and safety of its clients’ applications and data—including electronic health records (EHR) and billing information—to help them meet their compliance obligations and keep their client’s greatest asset, patient health information (PHI), secure. To address these needs, BRIDGE leverages a third-party data center and cloud provider. Two years ago, steadily declining service from its existing data center provider, paired with the provider’s impending acquisition by an international company, led BRIDGE to look for another infrastructure provider. In addition to high-quality service, 100% uptime and robust protections, BRIDGE also required value-based pricing for its non-profit customers. “Partnering with a provider that recognizes the challenges of non-profit organizations is important to us,” said Tracey Campbell, CEO at BRIDGE Healthcare Partners. “Nonprofits have the same security and uptime requirements as for-profit businesses; our clients just have more limited resources.”

The solution

Hybrid IT solution promotes 100% uptime and robust protections 

After conducting a competitive bid process, BRIDGE chose to partner with Flexential, deploying a cabinet in Flexential’s Denver - Englewood data center as well as a singletenant cloud environment out of Denver - Englewood that synchronously replicates to a Flexential cloud at its Denver - Aurora site.

To deploy this hybrid IT infrastructure, BRIDGE leveraged Flexential Professional Services (FPS). The expertise of FPS, combined with ongoing communication and collaboration with BRIDGE’s internal IT team, ensured a successful migration.

“Everything was deployed on time and as planned,” said Campbell. “Flexential’s proactive and continuous communication ensured the migration was seamless for our customers. This was critical because many of them operate ambulatory or clinical facilities that are open seven days a week and cannot tolerate disruptions.”

Flexential’s Denver - Englewood facility provides N+1 UPS redundancy and N+2 cooling redundancy to keep BRIDGE’s clients operating without downtime. This availability is backed by a 100% uptime commitment on power, cooling and connectivity.

Flexential also provides the physical and logical security to protect clients’ sensitive data. Featuring 4-zone security access, dual-factor authentication, biometric scanners, monitored security cameras and intercom system, and 24x7x365 security personnel and data center technicians, Flexential’s audit-ready facilities and compliant cloud infrastructure help BRIDGE and its clients meet the rigorous compliance requirements of the healthcare sector. Flexential also participates in annual, independent audits for SOC 1 Type II, SOC 2 Type II, SOC 3; NIST 800-53; ITAR; and SSAE 18, and its Denver - Englewood site is HITRUST CSF and PCI DSS compliant.

BRIDGE was also an early adopter of Flexential’s Hosted Private Cloud - Advanced Access solution, a hosted, private cloud offering that provides the MSP with full administrative access and control over its cloud deployments. Utilizing the solution, BRIDGE can automate application deployments and updates, scale applications and resources, manage configurations, and monitor and control cluster capacity proactively. BRIDGE can also leverage leading-edge third-party tools for workload management, DevOps, backups and other ancillary services. The flexibility and customization of the Flexential HPC - Advanced Access solution allows BRIDGE to service a wide range of clients’ needs.

The results

Eliminating downtime and strengthening client operations with hybrid IT

With Flexential’s redundant environment and round-the-clock monitoring, BRIDGE achieves the necessary availability to provide its clients with uninterrupted access to their critical applications and data. The real-time replication between its cloud environments delivers a built-in disaster recovery (DR) solution that ensures EHRs, billing information and other protected data are not lost if the environment goes down.

Flexential’s secure environment delivers additional peace of mind in an industry prone to breaches and cyberattacks. This was particularly crucial to one of BRIDGE’s new clients who was concerned by its unstable environment and the potential for cyberattacks. After transitioning the company to the Flexential private cloud, BRIDGE was able to alleviate these fears and deliver zero downtime, breaches and data loss.

“Flexential was key in helping us deliver 100% uptime and protect our clients from intensifying cyberthreats in a year with some high-profile attacks,” said Campbell. “Flexential is an extension of our team, and a critical part of our business strategy.” Focused on building powerful, reciprocal partnerships, Flexential continually strengthens its relationship with BRIDGE, becoming a trusted partner in the MSP’s and its customers’ IT journeys. “Our biweekly calls with our client success manager ensure our needs are always met,” said Campbell. “Flexential always has an eye on our IT environment, so we can continually offer our clients the highest quality services and support.”

This support was particularly essential amidst the uncertainties of the COVID-19 pandemic as BRIDGE’s clients faced service delivery challenges and a steep decline in patient volume. Flexential offered the stability to allow BRIDGE and its clients to continually operate with a confidence in the resiliency and security of their IT environments and the integrity of their data.

Flexential also offers a reciprocal partnership that presents BRIDGE with additional income opportunities by recommending Flexential solutions to its customers and prospects. Additionally, Flexential’s ever-expanding ecosystem of businesses offers BRIDGE additional growth opportunities as the MSP looks to expand its business into additional target markets.

“Flexential is in complete alignment with our strategic plan—from its people and service to its growth perspectives,” said Campbell. “We’re very impressed by the level of resources we work with on a day-to-day basis as well as at the strategic leadership level. Knowing we have a partner that embraces service quality as one of its key pillars is important to us."