Understanding SAML: How It Works and How Healthcare Organizations Can Implement It

A successful SAML deployment requires careful planning, selecting the right IDPs and SPs so that there is seamless interoperability between systems.

According to Trevor Thompson, principal software architect for Okta, healthcare organizations must start by choosing platforms that effectively support SAML. “You’ll find differing levels of maturity across systems,” he says. “You must choose systems that will interoperate well.”

Configuration also plays a crucial role, particularly in mapping out metadata exchanges. “SAML is a pretty old protocol, so the setup process and metadata exchange are manual, requiring administrators to understand and configure these elements properly,” Thompson says.

Organizations should also consider security settings such as encryption and signing algorithms, he says, to ensure compatibility between IDPs and SPs.

Then, test and monitor all configurations before a full deployment. “All of this setup has to be done, and then you have to test it and make sure it works for all users before rolling it out in production,” Thompson explains.

Once the connections are solid, teams can browse from a catalogue of SAML-capable applications to offer users a customized look and feel, Roncato notes.

“This makes all the difference in providing the best UX experience, as it tells users they are accessing a familiar and inherently trustworthy environment from wherever they work,” she says.

CONSIDER: Getting identity management right is crucial for healthcare security.

A Few Best Practices for Implementation

Successful SAML implementation requires careful planning and collaboration across multiple stakeholders to ensure seamless authentication and security.

Cairns recommends that organizations involve enterprise architects, security architects, IT and identity and access management teams, business application owners, developers, and legal/compliance teams early in the process.

“Planning and collaboration are crucial to success, and stakeholders from across the organization need to be involved,” Cairns says.

This cross-functional approach helps ensure that SAML integrates smoothly with business applications while maintaining compliance with data protection regulations.

Organizations must also decide on the right implementation model. Roncato notes that though on-premises federation servers were once the standard, they have become costly and difficult to maintain.

“Since most business applications are SaaS-based, Cloud SSO is now the preferred approach for most organizations,” she explains.

Implementing SAML through a service provider allows users to initiate authentication requests directly from an application or portal, while identity providers validate user credentials before granting access.

Roncato adds that implementing SAML through a token provider that supports multifactor authentication ensures that authentication requests are verified before access is granted.

This extra layer of validation helps protect against unauthorized access, allowing healthcare organizations to access cloud and on-premises applications through secure digital identities.