As an oncology massage therapist, Amy Tyler relishes sending her patients home in a blissful state. Sinking into the massage bed for a treatment can be transformative for cancer patients struggling with health issues such as pain, anxiety, depression and nausea.
“These patients are going through a pretty tough time and I am helping enhance their quality of life – and I think that is pretty magical,” Amy says.
“They walk out of the clinic in a pretty blissed-out state, they float out. You can be seeing somebody on one of their worst days and they still feel great after a treatment.”
With the care of her patients at the forefront of her work, Amy also wants them to feel comfortable when handing over their private medical details.
That’s why she enrolled in the free online Cyber Wardens education program, which she says gave her a sense of confidence in the cyber security basics.
She says as a sole trader, she doesn’t have the budget to hire an IT expert for her business Amy Tyler Therapeutic Massage.
“It’s a really easy course to do, and it was good to recap the basic things that we all should be doing, whether we’re running a business or not,” she says.
“What really helped were things like making sure that we’re backing up our data constantly.”
“So if something does happen, we actually have a backup to work off. And ensuring you have multi-factor authentication, and always install the latest software updates. These are not going to be time-consuming or cost a lot of money, but we just don’t do them.”
She likens the Cyber Wardens training to CPR training, saying it’s important to stay up to date.
“For me it’s a bit like my CPR training in that it’s just that repetition over time. I’ve done CPR as part of my clinic for every single year since I’ve created my business.”
“And you know, if and when the time comes that something happens, hopefully it will just click into my brain. I feel like that with the Cyber Wardens training.”
The therapist, who specialises in oncology, scar and lymphoedema massage, wears two professional hats, which makes cyber security even more important.
In addition to hands-on massage treatments at an Allied Health clinic in Waitara, Sydney, she also runs the Institute of Oncology Massage, an online training platform for massage therapists to specialise in working with cancer patients.
The health sector is the biggest target for cyber crime, and it’s never been more important for businesses and practices to secure their digital doors.
“Big companies have a tech department – but I am my tech department. So I don’t have the opportunity to constantly stay up to date on all techie stuff that’s going on and all the new things that are coming out. It’s a really important thing as a small business owner to do a course like this, as there’s going to be a time when we are all affected by cyber crime.”
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