The short answer, it depends. The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) is about more than just the tools you use, but how you use them. While some applications may never be HIPAA compliant, others that offer compliant features can still get you in trouble if your equipment is not physically secure, or if your employees are not trained to use the tools in a compliant way (i.e. walking away from a workstation without signing off or sharing passwords). At a minimum, HIPAA compliance requires you use the Pro version of windows, as Home versions do not offer the functionality required for HIPAA compliance. Additionally, your operating system must be currently supported by the software vendor. Any version of Windows prior to Windows 7 is not compliant, and Windows 7 will not be compliant after the Windows 7 end-of-life date on January 14, 2020. This article focuses on Windows 10 because other versions have reached or will soon reach end-of-life.

As technology advances so do the software needed to make it run efficiently. At the beginning of the year, Microsoft published a reminder that Windows 7 will lose support on January 14, 2020. If you're wondering how this affects you and your business, here are some things to consider.

It’s happened to all of us – your computer crashes just before you save the report you’ve been finishing all afternoon or the printer jams while you’re printing that big proposal. Anger, frustration, helplessness, and a touch of nausea are the result. These are the absolute worst feelings employees could have on the job, and the more frequently they feel them, the more likely you are to lose your top talent. Cost is often a big reason cited by business owners for not upgrading or advancing technology, but the truth is that fast computers, high-speed internet, accessible data backups, and secure electronic files are not luxury items. They are essential tools to most effectively utilize and retain your greatest asset and most limited resource – your most talented employees. According to the 2018 Global Talent Trends study by Mercer, “as [employees] support technology, they want technology to support them back – through state-of-the-art platforms that enable people to connect, collaborate, and innovate together.”