"Running head: CLOUD COMPUTING1Cloud ComputingStudent Name Course Name CLOUD COMPUTING2 Cloud ComputingIntroductionMost of the information is converted into digitalized form with the advancement in Informationtechnology and internet. Personal information related to health in the form of electronic healthrecords (EHRs) is available online with a purpose of getting the treatment in a better wayirrespective of the geographic location of patient and clinician. An enormous amount ofinvestment has been made by many countries such as Australia, United Kingdom and the UnitedStates of America in health information technology which includes EHR of patients. This hasbeen done with the objective of collecting and storing of patient data related to health. Somestudies showed that after the implementation of EHR, there is a reduction in the productivity ofclinician because of the increased workload to deal with electronic data. EHR should possess thefeatures which facilitate the health professionals to impart cost-effective, high-quality care. Thisshould be supported by the regulatory governments (Dean F. Sittig, 2014).Cloud computing is utilized by many tenants where the resources available on the cloud whichcan be shared according to the usage. Many organizations including hospitals are using cloudcomputing to access the EHR. Since many users are utilizing the similar resources, there is ahigh risk of privacy concern. Cloud service provider has the major responsibility to use thetechnologies with which the user’s data remains protected. Ability to guard the information of anindividual against others is known as privacy. For example, if an individual is suffering frommental disorder, then he has the right to maintain this data confidential and can be shared withthe clinician only. Amazon and Microsoft HealthVault are the examples of cloud computingsolutions which provide the services of EHRs. All the data should be encrypted first beforesending it to the cloud network. It can be done using attribute-based encryption (ABE) CLOUD COMPUTING3 techniques. A high level of privacy of patient’s information can be achieved using this method(Ming Li, 2012).Strenghts? Media transmission and videoconferencing advancements have been used in Hometelehealth applications to empower a healthcare provider to talk to their patients while athome. It is known as a virtual visit. It helps the clinician to provide the nonvisitconsultation based on the review of EHR with the aid of prevalent latest IT technologies.It also includes the use of various devices to report the certain health parameters whichboost the interactions. They have to utilize the software and processes in such a waywhich can guarantee the confidentiality of communication (Dean F. Sittig, 2014).? Assessing the health information has been done in which Internet plays a significant role.There are several education sites are available which possess the information based onpatient’s condition. Advancements in latest technologies will facilitate the healthcareprofessionals to treat the patients in case of asthma and diabetes. A physician can checkthe EHR of a patient remotely and give the early meditation to have the fast recovery.? One of the IT-empowered self-care is the telemonitoring framework of home asthma indaily routine. It gives individualized help to the patients consistently. Extensiveassessments of the Comprehensive Health Enhancement Support System (CHESS)structure exhibit the potential to develop illness information using online applications(George Demiris, 2015).? Improvement of Quality of system, economic savings, mobility, big data recording andenhancement in the efficiency of the medical staff are some of the other advantages ofusing cloud computing in the healthcare industry. CLOUD COMPUTING4 Weakness? There is a significant risk to the security of patient’s health data as all the records will beelectronically saved and can be accessed by the clinicians using the cloud computing.EHR’s can be viewed with the means of a safe and secure network which allows aclinician to have an access 24 by 7 by 365. Networks and systems should be designed insuch a way that it will protect the health data and would not allow someone to misuse it.It is the accountability of clinician that they must use various strategies in a usual mannerto guard the integrity of sensitive data. It can be done using complicated passwords,accessing the patient’s record of only those who are being treated by them and loggingoff the system properly. Some patients and clinicians want to hide the particularinformation such as psychiatry or alcohol treatment to maintain the privacy of the patient.? An essential feature of cloud computing is Auditing. There are compliance risks such ascorporate standards evaluation and lack of audit guidelines which are connected with thesafety. Cloud computing does not include the different service level agreements and thelegal aspects. The user has to bear in case of any data loss as because he has no right tosay anything to the service provider.? Network attack is the primary challenge to cloud computing. Inappropriate installation offirewall network and inadequate configuration of security within the cloud and onnetwork facilitate the attackers to get access to the cloud network with which they canperform their criminal activities.? Account hijacking includes software vulnerabilities, phishing, and fraud. Credentials ofthe user can be stolen by the hackers, and they can have the criminal access to the server.Confidentiality of the data and integrity of the service can be compromised in this case. CLOUD COMPUTING5 This can affect the personal relations of an individual. Due to the weak mechanism ofCloud authentication, a hacker can get access to the client’s user account easily.? Deletion or modification of the personal data can be done by the attackers which canresult in improper or wrong treatment of the patients if there will be any changes made tothe EHR. Data theft can be done by using such criminal activity. The unreliable datacenter, weak encryption algorithms and lack of authentication are some of the examplesof the security issues which are associated with the safety of data. Retention policies,secure storage of data, data backup and data integrity, can assist in resolving this concern(Issa M. Khalil, 2013).There are several examples of Cloud computing which provides e-health solutions such as:? Chelsea and Westminster London’s Hospital in 2011 set the system to store their EHRs.A security mechanism is implemented to secure the privacy of health records. Patientscan see the details of the individuals who can access their data.? Improved association with patients and enhanced teamwork between the medical staff arethe few advantages experienced in Italian Hospital of Bambino Gesu (GonzaloFernandez-Cardenosa, 2012).Following are the considerations while looking for the cloud based solution:? Amount of data which has to be transferred via Cloud? Informing the patients about the migration of their health data? Number of patients, Size of the hospital or medical centre. In case of any increase inrequirement, hospitals can contact the service provider to increase the resources.? Number of EHRs handled and size of EHRs.? Assessment of the time of availability of solution for the users "