The challenge

VITAS has two main user groups that participate in its mobility program. The first is its patient care staff. They are in the field, primarily working with patients in their homes so mobile devices allow them to gain remote access to information relevant to the patient. The devices are a means of connecting back to the company’s main database where its staff can update patient records and prescribe drug orders for patients. So mobile is critical in delivering patient care at Vitas. The second group is closer aligned to VITAS’ sales force and its members are responsible for business development and sales activity so they use devices when they are on the move to access emails and corporate resources.

“In the world of security, you have to be continuously creative, you can’t assume that the blocks you’ve enforced in the past are going to protect you in the future. So it’s a constant effort and Wandera is helping us to evolve and stay on top of fast-moving threats so we can continue to roll out transformative mobility programs.”

– Naresh Samlal, Area Vice President

Company profile

VITAS Healthcare is the largest provider of hospice and palliative care in the United States. 12,000 VITAS professionals including doctors, nurses and home health aides provide care and medical supplies and medications to more than 17,500 patients daily.

Headquartered in Miami, Florida, VITAS operates 93 locations across 14 states and the District of Columbia.

The solution

A lot of the policies VITAS enforced were mandated by the company’s security team and also included third party file sharing services, such as Dropbox and Box, which present a risk for sensitive data exfiltration on both mobile and desktop.

“Wandera deployment was amazingly simple. Our administrators are connected with the Wandera technical team and have access to all the necessary documentation. I specifically remember by the time we actually got on the phone for our first meeting about the technical aspect and configuration of Wandera, we already had it up and running. So the product was well supported from the deployment stance and it was a good introduction to what has turned out to be a really efficient integration. We get a ton of support from the Wandera team continuously, so the implementation was really easy and we found that it just works.”

Wandera allows admins to be proactive in protecting devices but for those unforeseen risks like phishing, data leaks and mobile malware, Wandera’s machine learning-powered threat intelligence works tirelessly to detect and prevent known and unknown threats before they reach the device.

“When I look at my RADAR dashboard in the morning and it’s got something like 3,600 to 4,000 blocks by Wandera, it makes me and my CISO very happy to know we have a product that protects us when we’re not looking and more so when we least expect it.”

Results

Wandera’s account managers work with its threat research and data science teams to provide bespoke analysis on an ongoing basis. One experience that the VITAS’ IT team found to be really positive was when they received a personalized alert from Wandera about cryptocurrency miners. This informed VITAS that there was an analysis done on the company’s mobile fleet to discover the impact of the threat, it highlighted the areas of vulnerability and ensured the team that the policy to protect against that type of threat had been put in place which immediately rectified the issue.

VITAS’ IT team checks Wandera’s admin console RADAR each day to access a variety customized dashboards showcasing real-time security information. Within the portal they also get instant alerts of new security incidents. Security analytics are not only provided through RADAR, but also through the end user app. The app shows employees the latest security alerts and information about their device.

“Wandera’s end user alerts have helped to engage our users, they have learnt over time what actions will trigger a block notification or security alert,” said Naresh Samlal, Area Vice President. “We now have a more educated population where they understand what the risks of their mobile usage are and they are starting to be more mindful.”

VITAS was recently awarded the Best Technology-Enabled Process Improvement Project at the 2018 PEX Network Awards. VITAS’ mobile solutions earned this award for successfully improving the patient transition experience into hospice by putting mobile devices in the hands of field staff to relay important care information more efficiently. Mobile devices have helped reduce time and errors incurred during patient admission and increased the speed to bedside by VITAS clinicians.

“Wandera is helping us to evolve and stay on top of fast-moving threats so we can continue to roll out transformative mobility programs. The Wandera team is awesome to work with. They have been extremely responsive and proactive with notifying me of the impact of new threats without me having to ask or go looking. I get that information sent to me in a very personalized manner. That makes me feel like Vitas is getting handled with white gloves and that’s the kind of partnership we signed up for and the kind of partnership we want with every one of our partners. It give us the belief in the Wandera team to be able to deliver what they say they’re going to deliver and go beyond that in many cases.”