Clear Clinica

HIPAA-compliant platform migration to AWS

You need to migrate a clinical trial support system from aging Rackspace to AWS for better performance and scalability, and you can't afford downtime for critical research operations. How do you execute a seamless migration while maintaining high uptime?

sales@itsyndicate.org

Innovation without interruption

Clear Clinica had clinical trial support systems running on an outdated Rackspace setup. The goal was clear - to proceed with supporting medical experiments, the infrastructure needed to be modernized and migrated to the cloud to improve performance, scalability, and reliability. The challenge was executing this migration without disrupting ongoing clinical trials or compromising the uptime that researchers depend on.

Quick facts

Clear Clinica

Life Sciences Clinical Trial Support

Clear Clinica provided technology solutions to medical professionals to conduct compliant clinical trials, requiring reliable, high-uptime infrastructure.

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No downtime during AWS migration

We executed Rackspace to AWS migration with minimal disruption to clinical systems, ensuring continuity of operations for critical medical research during the entire transition.

The best couple
AWS + HIPAA

We designed a HIPAA-compliant infrastructure on AWS EKS for Node.js and PHP microservices, with Aurora, Redis, and S3 integrations.

“ITsyndicate stands out because of their passion for problem-solving. Their efficiency and project management make them a valuable partner.”

Danny Lieberman

CEO, Clear Clinica

What we did for Clear Clinica

AWS migration & app modernization

For Clear Clinica, this was a high-stakes cloud migration project requiring careful planning, expert execution, and ongoing operational support. This required a strategy that prioritized data integrity and zero downtime, followed immediately by the implementation of modern workflows to accelerate future development. We started with:

Planning and executing the migration: We architected a modern AWS environment using Amazon EKS to orchestrate microservices, RDS with Aurora for managed databases, and S3 for storage. The migration plan was designed for zero disruption, ensuring that critical clinical trial operations continued seamlessly throughout the transition.
Establishing a robust DevOps framework: To modernize their development lifecycle, we implemented a BitBucket CI/CD pipeline and defined the entire infrastructure as code using Terraform. We utilized Helm to manage Kubernetes applications, reducing deployment times and ensuring that every release is consistent and repeatable.

Proactive optimization & support

Migrating to the cloud is only the first step - optimizing it for speed and reliability comes next. Researchers depend on fast data access, and the platform must be available whenever trials are active. We shifted focus to:

Performance tuning and optimization: Post-migration, we conducted comprehensive tuning to maximize infrastructure efficiency. By optimizing resource allocation within the Kubernetes cluster and leveraging Redis caching to reduce latency, we significantly improved the application speed and user experience for researchers.
Providing dedicated round-the-clock support: To ensure the high uptime essential for clinical research, we established a dedicated support team providing 24-hour coverage. Operating in shifts, this team guarantees rapid issue resolution and proactive system management, ensuring that technical issues never impede medical progress.

Compliant infrastructure for Healthcare: FAQ

How do you handle sensitive patient data to align with HIPAA?

By architecting the infrastructure with a "security by design" approach.

We start by mapping all Protected Health Information (PHI) data flows to understand where sensitive data lives and moves.

Based on this map, we isolate sensitive components into private subnets with strict IAM boundaries. We then enforce encryption for all data, both in transit (TLS) and at rest (using AWS KMS).

This is combined with comprehensive audit logging and least-privilege access policies, ensuring the platform aligns with HIPAA technical safeguards without slowing down developer velocity.

What level of visibility will we have into the platform's metrics?

For Clear Clinica, we implemented end-to-end observability, providing not just real-time performance data, but a complete, immutable audit trail for compliance.

We implement a full suite of metrics, logs, and alerts covering the clusters, services, and databases. Besides, clear Service Level Objectives (SLOs) are established for key indicators like availability and latency.

So when an alert triggers, it's linked to a specific runbook that guides engineers to a faster resolution, reducing Mean Time to Resolution (MTTR).

For compliance, audit trails like AWS CloudTrail preserve a detailed history of every event.

Is having backups the same as being prepared for a disaster?

No.

Backups are a component; true disaster recovery is a documented, practiced, and dependable capability that ensures clinical continuity.

Our process involves more than just automated snapshots. We define clear Recovery Point and Recovery Time Objectives (RPO/RTO) and document the full restore process.

Besides, we conduct regular recovery drills to test and validate these procedures, transforming the DR plan from a theoretical document into a proven, reliable process.

How do you manage cloud bills while planning for future growth?

Through a combination of proactive FinOps practices and data-driven capacity planning.

The goal is to control spending without ever compromising the performance needed for clinical trials.

We implement right-sizing for compute resources, configure intelligent autoscaling policies, and use storage lifecycle policies to move data to more cost-effective tiers. This controls day-to-day spending.

For long-term planning, we create capacity forecasts based on current usage and projected trial workloads, ensuring the platform can scale smoothly to meet future demand.

How do you prevent ad-hoc and untracked changes?

By implementing a GitOps workflow, which establishes Git as the single source of truth for the entire system's desired state. This eliminates manual random changes made via the command line.

In this model, all changes to infrastructure or applications are made through pull requests (PRs) to a Git repository.

These PRs are subject to peer review and a series of automated CI checks. Only after being approved and signed are the changes automatically reconciled to the cluster.

Such a process provides a clear, auditable history of every change and allows for instant, reliable rollbacks.

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Ready to migrate critical systems without disrupting your business?

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