Healthcare organisations generate large volumes of sensitive data across interconnected SAP systems, making testing, training and development difficult when non-production depends on full system copies of Production. In this blog, we explore how a more selective approach using EPI-USE Labs' Data Sync Manager (DSM) Suite can create lean, masked, fit-for-purpose environments with complete data integrity and current data on demand. This avoids the challenges of storage and cloud costs, data privacy and compliance risks, slow refreshes, and unrealistic test data.
SUMMARY: Healthcare organisations generate large volumes of sensitive data across interconnected SAP systems, making testing, training and development difficult when non-production depends on full system copies of Production. This raises storage and cloud costs, creates data privacy and compliance risks, slows refreshes, and also leaves teams with unrealistic test data. Find out how a more selective approach using EPI-USE Labs' Data Sync Manager (DSM) Suite can create lean, masked, fit-for-purpose environments with complete data integrity and current data on demand.
Healthcare is not one type of business. A hospital group, pharmaceutical manufacturer, and pharmacy chain all operate differently, with different processes, data and systems supporting their day-to-day work.
The data demands on healthcare organisations
A hospital manages patient records alongside employee payroll, procurement and finance. A pharmaceutical manufacturer deals with production, materials, quality and global supply chains. For a pharmacy chain, it is inventory, purchasing, stores and financial operations.
Despite these differences, one thing they have in common is the amount of data they generate. That volume keeps growing, and retention requirements set by regulation and internal policy mean very little of it can be removed. Much of it is also sensitive, including patient and clinical information, employee and payroll records, and in some cases, controlled product and supplier data.
For healthcare organisations running SAP, this data spans multiple interconnected systems, and keeping them running reliably depends on thorough testing, training and development.
When one of those systems needs to be built or refreshed, the most common approach is a full system copy of Production. Production contains the real business processes, relationships and historical information required to reproduce realistic scenarios, so copying it in full is the simplest way to get an environment that behaves like Production. However, if every copy is Production-sized, the organisation ends up maintaining those volumes across the whole non-production landscape as well.
Where does traditional SAP Test Data Management fall short in the healthcare industry?
A full system copy solves the data quality problem, but creates four others.
Storage and cloud costs
Every development, QA and training environment carries a Production-sized footprint. Multiply that across the landscape, and non-production often exceeds Production itself, at a higher infrastructure cost on SAP S/4HANA, where a larger appliance T-shirt size carries a direct price.
Data privacy and compliance
Healthcare organisations hold Personally Identifiable Information (PII) across clinical, HR and finance data. HIPAA, GDPR, PDPA, POPIA and other regional privacy laws all rest on the same principle. Personal data has to be protected wherever it exists, and none of these frameworks exempt non-production.
SAP takes the same position, stating in its Data Processing Agreement that data in non-production should be anonymised.
Slow, disruptive refreshes
A system copy is resource-heavy, involves business downtime, and requires lengthy post-processing, including BDLS. Because it is disruptive, it happens infrequently, and test data drifts further from Production between cycles.
Unrealistic test data
When real data can’t be used, or the last refresh is months old, testing teams fall back on manually created or incomplete data. A significant share of the work ends up running against the least reliable data in the landscape.
Moving beyond the full system copy
The obvious response is to copy less. But trimming data without understanding how it connects breaks data integrity; and test results are only as reliable as the data behind them.
The alternative is not to copy less of everything; it is to copy fewer data entities / business objects, each one with its dependent data intact. Links and document flows still hold, and the client behaves like Production, but at a fraction of the size; whether the data is information about patients, employees or suppliers. Sensitive data can also be masked before it leaves Production, so no unprotected personal data reaches the test environment.
A more selective approach to SAP data management can help.
That is what the EPI-USE Labs’ Data Sync Manager (DSM) Suite does. Components of the DSM Suite – Client Sync, Object Sync, Data Secure – provide ways to move and manage SAP data, without relying on a full system copy of Production for every requirement.
| What healthcare organisations need | How DSM delivers it |
|---|---|
| Test environments that behave like Production – without carrying a Production-sized footprint | Client Sync builds lean, fit-for-purpose clients with full functionality and complete data integrity, typically under 30% of Production size. It also removes the need for BDLS, since logical system values are resolved while the data is still in memory. |
| Current data between refreshes, without manual recreation | Object Sync gives testing team data on demand. A specific patient case, employee record or purchasing document flow is copied into an existing test client with all dependent data intact, so links and document flows still hold, and nobody waits for the next refresh window. |
| Sensitive data protected before it reaches non-production | Data Secure scrambles and masks sensitive data such as addresses, contact information and bank information, using pre-defined rules, extendable to organisation-specific and industry-specific fields. Because it is integrated with Client Sync and Object Sync, data is masked before it leaves the source system, so environments can be opened up to external partners and support teams without exposing a real record. |
| Training and project environments without a lasting footprint | Environments loaded with realistic, masked data can be built for a training cohort or a project phase using Client Sync and Object Sync, then removed once the work is done, rather than sitting in the landscape at Production size. |
Why does the IS-H timeline increase the testing burden?
For hospitals running SAP IS-H (Industry Solution – Healthcare) for patient management, there is a timeline attached to all of this. IS-H runs on SAP ECC; and mainstream maintenance for ECC ends in 2027, with paid extended maintenance available until 2030.
As support winds down, the demand for representative test data can increase. When a Production issue needs to be investigated, reproducing the problem in a non-production environment becomes more important for diagnosis and resolution. Testing also remains necessary as regulatory and legal changes continue to require updates, even when there is less standard support and delivery to fall back on.
Insights from a DSM developer
Thealize Breytenbach has spent nine years in development support for DSM. In this short video, she explains how Client Sync copies healthcare-specific data, including patient, clinic and transactional records, from Production into non-production systems, and how Data Secure masks the sensitive information before it gets there.
A clearer view of the SAP healthcare landscape
Healthcare organisations may run very different businesses, but they share the same test data problem. Sensitive data spans the whole landscape, volumes keep growing, and very little can be deleted.
Copying all of it into non-production is not the only way to get realistic test data, and it is an expensive way to get it. A lean, masked landscape cuts the storage footprint, gives testing teams current data without waiting for a refresh, and keeps the most sensitive data inside Production where it belongs. Read about how some of our clients in Healthcare have used DSM successfully.
Running SAP in a healthcare organisation? See how DSM can reduce your system size and protect your sensitive data.
EPI-USE Labs offers a free DSM readiness assessment, providing a view of system sizes, largest tables, supported objects and potential savings across the landscape, at no cost.