Backing Up Your Practice Data

Your practice’s PCC Server, either located in a secure cloud or in a physical server at your practice, contains the record of your A/R as well as important patient medical information. A backup protects that data from fire, natural disasters, or a server crash.

Because backups are so important, your PCC Server is configured to perform an overnight backup every night. Your server is backed up to both a secure remote location as well as a local network drive. You can also perform a backup manually at any time.

The sections below describe PCC’s different backup solutions, how to run a manual backup.

Your Office’s Custom Backup Solution

Every office is different, and PCC works to find the best backup solution depending on your location, office configuration, and other factors.

Here is a summary of PCC’s different backup solutions:

  • Network Accessible Storage: PCC typically installs a networked hard drive in each practice’s office that automatically backs up all data. The NAS drive is a fast, local backup that makes data recovery easy.

  • Remote Backup: PCC uses a secure, encrypted internet connection to backup your data on a remote server. This solution requires very little maintenance and ensures that data is encrypted and safely stored offsite.

  • RAID Array: If your practice has a physical server in your office, that server includes a RAID array, one or more extra hard drives that automatically duplicate all information on the server. RAID is not a backup solution and can not be used to recover deleted files. Instead, your RAID array prevents data loss in the event of a hard drive failure. One faulty drive can be swapped out for a working drive without any interruption of service.

Contact PCC Support at 1-800-722-1082 or support@pcc.com to discuss backup solutions for your practice. We periodically review the technical needs of your practice to ensure your data is safe and secure from theft, natural disaster, and hardware failure.

PCC Does Not Keep a Copy or Store Your Data: PCC does not maintain a copy of your data at our central office. Your data is kept on a server and on an encrypted local storage device, both of which remain under your office’s oversight at all times. An encrypted copy is also stored at secure remote “cloud” location.

Perform a Manual Backup (backups)

When a nightly backup fails, or when you need to move a physical PCC server or shut it down for an extended period, or a major storm is due in your area, you may wish to do a manual backup of your data.

Ask PCC: You can call PCC support at any time and ask them to begin an immediate back up of your data. Please allow several hours for the backup to complete. If you anticipate needing to restore from that backup, you should stop working on your system after that backup has begun as new changes will be lost.

You can also begin a backup yourself, without contacting PCC Support. Follow this procedure:

Warn Your Staff and All Users

Tell your office staff to log off the system. Make sure everyone has finished their current task and logged off.

Open a Practice Management Window

Run the Backups Program

Run the “Backup the System” option from the System Administration menu in th Practice Management window.

You can also run backups from a UNIX prompt.

Select a Local-Only or Remote Cloud Backup

Select “S) System Image Backup” to backup your PCC server to your NAS device, which is located in your office.

Select “T) System Image Backup (also to cloud)” to backup your PCC server to both your local NAS device as well as to a remote, cloud backup service.

Wait for Backup to Finish

Depending on the option you select and the size of your practice, your backup will take from one to three hours.

Check that the Backup Was Successful

You will see a message telling you whether or not the backup was successful.

  • Last modified: February 23, 2021