Case Study: The Everett Clinic achieves proactive privacy protection and rapid breach detection with FairWarning

FairWarning Enables Proactive Privacy Protection

The Everett Clinic, a 16-location health system serving Snohomish County since 1924, faced the challenge of enforcing a strict privacy policy and meeting HIPAA/ARRA HITECH auditing requirements across multiple clinical systems (Epic, McKesson, ProVation, IMPAC, etc.). After attempting to develop an internal log-review tool, the clinic evaluated FairWarning through a proof-of-concept to validate automated, multi-application monitoring and secured buy-in from IT, Compliance, and Legal.

Everett implemented FairWarning in under 75 days and integrated authoritative user data from Kronos to reduce false positives and enable targeted alerts (self-access, family-member viewing, VIPs, watchlist thresholds). The system quickly identified improper accesses that led to employee terminations, timely patient notifications, and a resolvable federal inquiry; Compliance can now complete investigations in minutes, improving efficiency and confidence in protecting patient privacy.

Everett Clinic

Al Fisk

Chief Medical Officer, Everett Clinic