My practical intranet knowledge is woefully short. (AC is replacing a DOS system!) We employ multiple backups in small part from ignorance and terror, but I did find one interesting point. We expanded on our personal disaster plan, (at a meeting, question, "OK, the building burns to the ground during the night, now what?") Answering that question helped us to visualize what the backup must be capable of AND the spin-off benefit from a marketing standpoint: Prospective patients who are leery about EMR's ask "Oh yeah? Well what do you do if there is a power failure?" Now my answer nails them to the floor, "Of course I stop seeing patients while we get it fixed, because the elevator stops, the lights go out and Air Conditioning shuts off. But I'll tell you this: For the first time in 20 years I have a plan if the Building Burns down, which by the way would destroy all of the paper charts forever! If we have a fire, I am stopping at Mickey Thompson RV rental on the way into work and getting a big RV. Our office manager is calling Todd at Computer Technology Unlimited, and getting him to bring a server, router and hub, with a few laptops over to the RV. We will backup from AC on the East Coast, and be able to start handling calls from the parking lot in about 6 hours." Very effective argument. (And the backup must be in more than one site, too cheap to do and to risky not to do!)
