“Accessing a clinical service such as an electronic health record (EHR) or a radiology system through the cloud can offer significant benefits compared with more traditional systems. This deployment model does not, however, eliminate a healthcare delivery organization’s security considerations. It only changes them.”

So warn the experts at ECRI, an independent nonprofit that shares best practices, collects incident reports and reviews health care technology and safety, in their newly released report, Top Ten Technology Hazards for 2023.^[1]

ECRI’s Device Evaluation group compiles the list—this is the 16th edition—based on “the potential sources of technology-related danger that we believe warrant the greatest attention” during that year.

Items on the list “are not necessarily the most frequently reported problems or the ones associated with the most severe consequences—although we do consider such information in our analysis. Rather, the list reflects our judgment about which risks should be given attention now to help care providers, as well as device manufacturers, prioritize their patient safety efforts,” the report notes.

Importantly, “all the items on our list represent problems that can be avoided or risks that can be minimized through the careful management of technologies,” the group writes.