AMA SA partners with efex to help practices manage technology and cyber risk

Most practices think about their technology on the days it stops working. The appointment book will not open, the phones are down, or the practice management system is unavailable while the waiting room fills up.

An incident like that is rarely just an IT problem. It can mean cancelled appointments, patient records that cannot be reached, billing that stalls, and staff trying to keep care going without the systems they rely on. The recovery takes days of work that nobody planned for.

For most practices this is the part of the business they are least equipped for. Technology and cyber security sit well outside clinical training, and practice managers are usually carrying them alongside everything else they do.

AMA SA has appointed efex as its exclusive partner in technology, cyber security and practice continuity so that members have somewhere to start. efex has a team of technology specialists based in Adelaide and has worked with medical practices since 2006, supporting more than 300 medical and allied health practices across Australia and New Zealand, from general practice and specialist rooms to diagnostic imaging.

The timing reflects where the risk now sits. Health service providers reported more data breaches last year than any other sector in Australia: 225 notifications to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner in 2025, 19 per cent of the national total of 1,205. The Australian Signals Directorate found that malicious actors succeeded in 95 per cent of the healthcare and social assistance incidents its Cyber Security Centre responded to in 2024 to 2025, compared with close to 52 per cent across all sectors, and that ransomware incidents against the sector doubled over the same period.

Healthcare is targeted more often than most sectors and, once targeted, breached more often. Practices cannot simply stop seeing patients while an issue is fixed, so the resulting cancellations, delays and lost income can cost more than the repair.

The partnership begins with research. From 18 September AMA SA will invite members to complete an anonymous survey on how South Australian practices use technology, where it disrupts them, and how prepared they are for a cyber incident.

What members report will decide what gets built. Rather than assuming in advance what practices need, AMA SA and efex will use the findings to develop a suite of practical guides and tools covering the issues that come up most. These will be published for members through medicSA and the AMA SA website as they are completed.

efex will also run education sessions for practice owners and practice managers, including a roundtable on the practical use of artificial intelligence in medical practice and a masterclass on cyber resilience drawing on the survey results. Members will see regular articles in medicSA and on the AMA SA website on the questions practices ask most often, such as what to do in the first hour of a cyber incident.

AMA SA Chief Executive Officer Simon Jones said the partnership responded to something members had raised repeatedly.

'Our members are running businesses as well as caring for patients, and technology and cyber security have become increasingly difficult areas to manage. What we hear consistently is that many practices do not know where to start. This partnership will give members a clearer view of their current position and practical support shaped by the experience and needs of South Australian medical practices.'

efex Chief Executive Officer Nick Sheehan said the first job was to listen.

'From our discussions practices are clearly not short of people telling them what to buy. What they are short of is an objective read on their own technology, cyber security and practice continuity. That is why the survey comes first. We would rather find out what South Australian practices are dealing with Fand then build the support program around their needs.'

One part of the partnership is available now. 

Members can request a complimentary cyber security audit, which gives a practice an objective view of where it stands against the Essential Eight, the baseline set of cyber security measures published by the Australian Signals Directorate, this will enable practices to understand their current risks and readiness for a cyber attack and will provide a useful list of what to address first.

Request the complimentary cyber security audit here

About efex

efex works with more than 10,000 organisations from 25 locations nationally. Its healthcare business covers practice management systems, secure messaging, clinical applications, private cloud hosting, vendor management and the everyday support that keeps a practice running.