text: TechSectors: Back up That Data!
  It would be impossible to overstate the importance of backing up your practice data. This is especially true in this era of electronic medical records (EMRs). In fact, the HIPAA Security Rule...
  • Full Back-up — includes all data files and system settings for your computer. These do not include your operating system or program files. If you want to do a full (or "bare metal") backup, you'll need to use a program that makes a duplicate "image" of your computer. Windows Vista Business provides this functionality, or you can use software such as Acronis to easily accomplish this task.
  • Differential Back-up — backs up only those files that have changed since the last full back-up. This makes for a rapid back-up process, but also makes a system restore much more tedious because the full back-up and each incremental back-up must be individually restored; this would save each follow-up visit individually after the initial history and physical.
  • Incremental Back-up — backs up all changes since the last back-up of any kind. Thus, a restore operation would only need the full and the latest incremental.