Microsoft Teams Archive – An Essential Approach to Telehealth Data Management

 Analyzing Microsoft Teams Archive's expanding position as the healthcare sector shifts to telehealth in the face of rising cyberattacks

There does not seem to be a foreseeable conclusion to the pandemic, with new variants surfacing from time to time, a recurrent rise in cases, and inadequate data on the latest coronavirus strains. The healthcare business, which was one of the most impacted, was put under a lot of stress from the start and is still struggling to cope. Despite that, like other industries, the healthcare sector has quickly evolved toward virtual parts of healthcare, i.e., telehealth. The use of Microsoft Teams in the industry was one such innovation, allowing physicians, patients, and other stakeholders to communicate and work in the new normal.

With its office-grade ability to schedule and conduct doctor-patient virtual appointments, secure mode of storing and sharing patient records, protecting PHI in compliance with HIPAA, and enhancing team collaboration, Microsoft Teams enabled telehealth to benefit doctors, patients, and the industry alike. So much so that it is currently one of the most popular ways of communication among industry experts, and it is being utilized for a variety of healthcare data management purposes, including seamless data collection, broadcasting complex operations, shift coordination, speeding productivity, and data security and compliance.

However, according to the HIPAA Journal, an average of 59 data breaches were recorded per month between January 1 and December 31, 2021, with 712 healthcare data breaches documented. This is a new peak for healthcare data breaches, with this year's total outnumbering last year's by 70% – an increase of 10.9% from 2020. The surge in these attacks might be linked to a rise in black market demand for PHI, especially after the pandemic. As a result, protecting PHI and other healthcare information has never been more critical.

Microsoft Teams Archive

Microsoft Teams' built-in security and compliance capabilities have played a critical role in preserving sensitive documents and maintaining HIPAA compliance. However, organizations are choosing added levels of protection for their patient data – Microsoft Teams Archive.

The first step in achieving this increased degree of security is to identify and categorize PHI data, such as patient test results and insurance policies, as critical using sophisticated metadata and content-based control mechanisms. These aids healthcare organizations in streamlining their priorities and determining what data must be protected and what data is redundant, obsolete, or trivial (ROT).

Since HIPAA requires that any outdated patient information be updated or defensibly deleted, purging the firm's ROT data is the next step. By doing so, healthcare organizations avoid the danger of having too much data and save on storage. Applying lifecycle policies to records based on the date of creation, event, and metadata-based triggers also helps boost this level of protection. It aids in establishing the appropriate age for an update or deletion of a record per applicable regulations.

However, the data becomes siloed by doing so, posing problems when searching records for compliance management or legal reasons. As a result, healthcare organizations are opting for a higher degree of compliance and legal protection when searching. An advanced search capability that can search across the enterprise through all the documents for seamless legal and compliance request handling.

Therefore, a Microsoft Teams Archive solution – an added security element that helps reduce risk by archiving and improving the safeguarding of critical data and securely controlling it through encryption. It facilitates compliance cooperation by recording essential tool information such as chats, files, reactions, and the context surrounding these interactions. Furthermore, such a Microsoft Teams Archiving solution supports data transformation into an asset by merging in-place and archived Microsoft Teams content and metadata to give valuable insights on discussions.


To sum it up, telehealth is the way of the future in healthcare, and using platforms like Microsoft Teams to assist in improving the care system is here to stay. Cyberattacks on healthcare networks seeking PHI will also continue. Therefore, it is our job to protect and secure patient data to the greatest extent feasible by installing additional levels of protection, such as an archiving solution. To learn more about the product, its capabilities, and how it might assist your organization, contact our ZL Tech Expert.

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