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Contents
3 Southern Oregon Orthopedics: Scales to meet growth and protect critical data
6 DuPage Medical Group: Increasing security, saves millions and improves patient care
9 TGen: Accelerates analysis and improves patient quality of life
12 Promise Healthcare: Improves network visibility and increases compliance with Dell security solution
15 Comanche County Medical Center: Improves security, compliance and business continuity
18 First Choice Emergency Rooms: Virtualizes data center to serve patients faster, increase system security and enable growth
21 Health Net Connect: Helps hospitals cut readmissions and improve patient care
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Protecting patient data, simply and effectively Southern Oregon Orthopedics
The physicians at Southern Oregon Orthopedics certainly keep busy. As southern Oregon’s largest orthopedic
surgery group, it performs more than 3,800 operations each year for injuries and illnesses that affect the spine,
shoulders, knees, feet, ankles, hips, wrists and hands.
Due to the nature of the care it provides, Southern Oregon Orthopedics has a large and expanding patient
base. That means the medical staff is constantly handling sensitive patient personal data, including health
records and financial information.
To gain efficiencies and adopt electronic records more widely, the organization’s medical team began to
access more data on laptops and tablets, making data encryption an immediate priority.
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Southern Oregon Orthopedics—Scales to meet growth and protect critical data
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When Nugent and his team began their
search for a new data protection solution,
they immediately turned to Dell. Adding
Dell Data Protection | Encryption was a
natural fit.
Needing to ensure HIPAA and HITECH compliance
Like most medical organizations, Southern Oregon
Orthopedics is required to comply with federal HIPAA and
HITECH regulations. Data encryption, a key part of a
HIPAA-compliant security solution, involves constant
monitoring and regular assessments. In addition,
organizations must generate and archive audit trails that
provide critical information such as who accessed what
data, where, how and when.
Compliance is challenging, especially where mobile devices
are involved. Medical professionals often use their own
PCs, laptops and mobile devices to communicate across
unsecured networks without encryption or other
safeguards. Along with the possible theft or accidental
loss of data from these devices, networks can be
vulnerable to attacks and malicious activities by hackers,
third-party service providers, technology vendors or
healthcare employees.
Automatic rollout
of encryption to
any new devices
Southern Oregon Orthopedics—Scales to meet growth and protect critical data
Southern Oregon Orthopedics deals with all these
challenges. Its physicians regularly access patient data
remotely, sometimes on personal devices. The group needed
an encryption solution that could ensure compliance without
bogging down its processes and frustrating users.
Seeking better data protection technology
Jeremy Nugent, IT director for Southern Oregon Orthopedics,
was given the task of protecting the surgical group’s data and
ensuring compliance with state and federal regulations.
Although there was an existing system in place, it required a
long, laborious process to manage and demonstrate
compliance. End users were frustrated by the need to enter
a complicated password before they could log on to their
devices. Nugent knew he had to find a better solution, for
himself and for the medical team he supported.
Making the case for Dell Data Protection | Encryption
Nugent knew the cost of a lost laptop or tablet would
greatly exceed the price to replace the device. He would
also need to determine the extent of data loss exposure
and who should be notified in the event of a data loss. In
addition, Nugent had to consider the irreplaceable costs
of lost patient confidence.
When Nugent and his team began their search for a new
data protection solution, they immediately turned to Dell.
Because they already had Dell systems in place, adding
the Dell Data Protection | Encryption (DDP | E) solution
was a natural fit.
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Nugent met with other key decision makers and
drew attention to known security gaps, making a
convincing case for DDP | E. Ultimately, the
organization chose to implement DDP | E on 25
devices, including laptops and tablets.
Getting the solution up and running in four hours
Once Nugent had approval to implement DDP | E, the
Dell team walked him through every step of the
process. In just four hours, they showed Nugent how to
download and install DDP | E on the existing servers,
how to roll out the solution to the devices, configure
policies for Southern Oregon Orthopedics’ specific
requirements, and run reports to demonstrate
compliance.
With DDP | E up and running, Nugent was for the first
time able to get a big-picture view of the encryption
status for all of his devices at once on the management
console. “It was simple to implement and in the end,
Dell Data Protection | Encryption gave us the result we
were looking for,” he says.
Seamless device protection without impacting
user productivity
The Southern Oregon Orthopedics IT team now spends much
less time deploying and documenting their encryption. By
creating a group policy they can automatically roll out the
appropriate encryption to any devices added to the group. And
end users are happier because the solution is completely
transparent, so they no longer have to take any action to
ensure data is protected.
As Southern Oregon Orthopedics continues to grow and
find ways to provide more efficient care for its patients,
Nugent is happy knowing that DDP | E offers a highly
scalable solution that can grow with the organization. It
can protect not just its laptops and tablets, but also external
media like USBs, CDs and DVDs.
Thanks to DDP | E, Southern Oregon Orthopedics has a
clear view of its encryption policies across the entire
organization. And more importantly, the team knows that
should a disaster happen, their data is protected. And that
makes everyone rest easier.
Solution rolled
out in four hours
Full visibility into data encryption
status for numerous laptops and tablets
Southern Oregon Orthopedics—Scales to meet growth and protect critical data
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4hours
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Stronger security, more time for patients DuPage Medical Group
Healthcare providers like Chicago’s DuPage Medical Group (DMG) are under constant pressure to improve the
quality of patient care, reduce operational costs and safeguard data.
To address those challenges, DMG builds the most advanced facilities and implements the latest technology.
For example, through secure access to an electronic health records (EHR) system based on EPIC software, as
well as the group’s MyChart patient portal, physicians stay closer to their patients, achieving the best healthcare
outcomes.
To give administrators and clinicians access to the EPIC EHR and patient portal, DMG relies on an extensive
desktop infrastructure. But to reduce the total cost of desktop ownership, lower energy consumption, and
simplify maintenance and support, the organization wanted to pursue a thin-client computing strategy.
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DuPage Medical Group—Increasing security, saves millions, and improves patient care
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“Dell Wyse ThinOS is immune to viruses and
malware.”
IT managers save time and improve service uptime
One of the main reasons that DMG chose thin clients from
Dell Wyse is management simplicity. Specifically, Dell Wyse
Power consumption
reduced by more
than 75 percent
DuPage Medical Group—Increasing security, saves millions, and improves patient care
The ability to store all operational and patient data centrally
in a Citrix® environment is also helping DMG streamline
compliance. “Because most of our data is stored centrally
on our Citrix servers, not on our Dell Wyse thin clients, we
have far fewer hard drives in our environment, and it’s
much easier and more cost-effective to achieve HIPAA
compliance,” says Jeff Kummerer, director of enterprise
architecture at DMG.
New clinics are integrated faster
The DMG IT team is able to support the group’s strategy of
growth through acquisition with Dell Wyse. “In the past,
integrating new clinics into our infrastructure was slow and
time-consuming because we had to configure each new
machine manually with the right image, Active Directory
settings, device drivers, anti-virus software and more,” says
Kummerer. “Now, taking on new clinics is faster and easier,
saves us time, minimizes issues and
improves service uptime for our users.”
Security increased for critical systems
DMG has also been able to increase the
security of its critical systems and
patient data with Dell Wyse devices,
which are powered by Dell Wyse
ThinOS. “Because Dell Wyse ThinOS is
immune to viruses and malware, we can
protect our operational and patient data
and streamline HIPAA compliance,” says
Yu.
DMG selects a Dell Wyse thin-client solution
After deciding that Dell Wyse thin clients were the right
choice, DMG worked with Dell Wyse to select and
deploy a range of different thin-client devices across the
group. Albert Yu, manager of client computing at DMG,
says, “We have about 3,750 Dell Wyse C10, V10, S10 and
T10 thin clients for administrators and doctors, and
about 150 Dell Wyse X50 laptops, which are used by
nurses. With Dell Wyse, there’s a device to meet every
need in the clinical setting, which helps us strike the right
balance between features and cost every time.”
provides Device Manager, a tool for managing, updating and
reporting on thin-client endpoints quickly and cost-
effectively. “We have visibility of our entire desktop enterprise
in real time with Dell Wyse Device Manager,” says Yu. “We
monitor the health of our thin clients continually, which
75%
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The organization also saves on power usage. “A PC uses
about 80 watts in full operation, but a Dell Wyse thin client
uses just 7 to 15 watts, and thin clients produce less heat,
which reduces air-conditioning costs,” says Kummerer.
“This means we have reduced our desktop power
consumption by more than 75 percent with Dell Wyse, and
we have lowered our carbon emissions.”
Support issues are resolved three to four times faster
If a support issue is reported, it can be resolved three to
four times faster on Dell Wyse thin clients. “If we have a
hardware problem with a thin client, we don’t need to
spend any time on troubleshooting,” says Kummerer. “We
can just swap out the device, plug in a replacement,
configure it through Wyse Device Manager, and the user
can get back to work. It’s a very easy process, with
minimal to no downtime.”
Patient care is improved
With less downtime due to hardware issues, DMG clinical
staff can deliver the best care for their patients. “Users
have faster, more reliable access to the applications they
need on their Dell Wyse thin clients, which means they
can spend more time with their patients,” says
Kummerer. “We can give doctors and other clinical staff
all the information they need to make the best diagnosis
and treatment decisions, and Dell Wyse is playing a
major role in our success.” $2.2 million saved on desktop procurement
DuPage Medical Group—Increasing security, saves millions, and improves patient care
Acquisition of new
clinic facilitated
three months faster
because Dell Wyse thin clients can be deployed and
configured quickly and easily with Wyse Device
Manager.”
DMG recently shaved three months off a major
acquisition of a five-site clinic, with 200 end users and
desktops. “In the past, an acquisition of this size would
have taken us six months to complete,” says Kummerer.
“However, it took just three months with Dell Wyse,
bringing us major time and cost savings.”
DMG saves $2.2 million and reduces power
consumption by more than 75 percent
The DMG IT team saves about $550 per device
compared with thick-client PCs. “With 4,000 thin clients
in our enterprise, we’ve saved as much as $2.2 million
on desktop procurement over the years with Dell Wyse,”
says Kummerer.
2.2MIL
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Saving more lives through high-performance computing TGen
The geneticists and bioinformaticians and at the Translational Genomics Research Institute (TGen) are more
than just researchers—they’re the unsung heroes of countless families.
These researchers help more people survive diseases such as neuroblastoma, a deadly cancer
typically afflicting children. They do so by developing a custom chemotherapy treatment that targets a
patient’s diseased cells and minimizes damage to healthy tissue.
Because the treatments depend on fast analysis of patient genome sequencing, TGen maintains a high-
performance computing (HPC) cluster that delivers the server performance, storage capacity, network
bandwidth and availability that researchers need. “Our staff includes some of the top people working on
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TGen—Accelerates analysis and improves patient quality of life
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cutting-edge genetic and bioinformatics research,” says
James Lowey, vice president of technology at TGen. “We
have an obligation to ensure that our employees always have
access to the best possible IT equipment and infrastructure.”
A research infrastructure pushed to its limits
Although TGen had deployed an HPC cluster based on the
Dell Genomic Data Analysis Platform, it was pushed to its
limits by increasingly complex workloads, weekly additions
of new software and fast-growing patient volumes. That
sometimes made it difficult for researchers to get available
nodes, and they often waited days to move data from
storage to nodes due to network bottlenecks. Also, with
data from a single genome measuring up to 4 terabytes,
sequencing a patient’s genome took about two weeks, with
additional analysis for custom treatments taking at least
seven days.
“To get that kind of industry-leading
power in that small of a footprint is huge.”
Installed, configured and
launched HPC cluster in days
TGen—Accelerates analysis and improves patient quality of life
Scaling an HPC cluster in days instead of weeks
After evaluating various technologies, TGen chose to scale
its cluster with Dell servers, storage and networking
equipment. “I’m not aware of any other solution on the
market that’s like the Dell Genomic Data Analysis Platform,”
Lowey says. “It’s optimized for genomic workflows out of
the box, and within a few days, you can install, configure
and launch it into production. Other HPC systems generally
take weeks or months to get everything up and running.”
To increase compute capacity, TGen added 32 Dell
PowerEdge M420 server blades with Intel Xeon® processors
to an existing Dell PowerEdge M1000e chassis. “We get 512
cores in 10U with Dell PowerEdge M420 servers,” says Lowey.
“To get that kind of industry-leading power in that small of a
footprint is huge.” TGen also deployed six Dell PowerVault
MD3460 arrays and scaled its existing Terascala storage to
hold 1 petabyte rather than 215 terabytes. This dense solution,
which is faster than the previous storage solution by 12
gigabits per second, will help the company keep pace with
100 percent year-to-year data growth.
Because positive patient outcomes often correlate directly
with the amount of data that researchers can analyze and
the speed of analysis, TGen needed a more scalable cluster
that it could optimize to boost performance.
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Accelerating performance with two networks
To minimize network bottlenecks, TGen segregated
traffic between two separate networks. An Ethernet
network facilitates cluster component communication,
which features Dell Networking S4810 switches at the
top of the rack. An InfiniBand® fibre network, based on
four Mellanox® SX6036 FDR switches, supports all other
traffic including connections between TGen offices and
its data center.
To design and deploy its new technologies, IT personnel
collaborated with Dell Infrastructure Consulting Services.
“Once the Dell consultants were done, all our people had
to do was manage the final configuration so our
researchers could start using the cluster to crunch
genomic data as soon as possible,” says Lowey.
and speed of research,” says Lowey. The result?
Researchers can now develop custom treatments at
least one week faster. They have reduced the time
needed for genetic sequencing from 14 days to 10 days
and accelerated the analytical processes that facilitate
custom treatments from 7 days to 4 hours.
Improving the quality of life for more children
Every hour, a child is diagnosed with cancer. TGen
can now help more children survive, and improve the
outcomes for people battling other diseases. “Having
this dedicated HPC resource enables us to really dig
down into the intricacies and the complexities of the
human genome and have a very positive impact on
pediatric oncology as well as other projects,” says
Lowey. “So today, we help save more lives because
researchers spend less time waiting for HPC resources.”
TGen—Accelerates analysis and improves patient quality of life
Reduced genetic
sequencing time
from 14 days to 10
Maintaining high availability and
supporting 100 percent annual data growth
IT personnel minimize downtime by remotely managing
servers via the integrated Dell Remote Access Controller
(iDRAC) with Lifecycle Controller. “With iDRAC in Dell
PowerEdge servers, we can manage servers, troubleshoot
issues and hard-reset nodes from virtually anywhere,
including my living room. So we save quite a bit of time and
we’re able to maintain 99 percent availability, system wide,”
Lowey says.
Developing custom treatments at least one week faster
TGen researchers have the compute resources they need
with the larger, faster HPC cluster. “Recently, for the first
time ever, our researchers logged 1 million CPU hours on
our Dell HPC cluster — significantly increasing the amount
Accelerated
analytical processes
that facilitate custom
treatments from 7
days to 4 hours
4hrs
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Delivering stronger security and easier compliance Promise Healthcare
Promise Healthcare is one of the largest long-term acute care (LTAC) hospital organizations in the United States,
with about 5,000 staff members and 21 healthcare facilities nationwide.
As a large company in a highly regulated industry, Promise Healthcare needs to focus on improving security and
achieving regulatory compliance. For example, it is subject to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability
Act (HIPAA), so it must have reliable systems in place to control and monitor personal health information (PHI),
protect PHI systems from intrusion, and provide documentation of those practices.
However, the company’s firewall infrastructure was failing to deliver the level of security and HIPAA compliance
the healthcare organization required. “The prior firewall didn’t have many of the features we needed, such as
content filtering to prevent users from accessing dangerous websites,” explains Mark Moch, IT manager at
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Promise Healthcare. “And while the device did have
intrusion prevention built in, when we turned that feature
on, it would break our network, causing traffic to crawl. As
a result, we were forced to turn it off. This left us with a
security exposure and the inability to meet the intrusion
prevention requirement by HIPAA.”
A high-performing, easy-to-use firewall solution
After comparing various firewall solutions, Promise
Healthcare selected Dell SonicWALL Network Security
Appliance (NSA) 6600 firewalls and deployed them in its
main data center. The Dell SonicWALL NSA 6600 is designed
to secure large distributed and corporate central site
environments requiring high throughput capacity and
performance. Two security services run on the firewall to
ensure complete protection. The solution also includes the
Dell SonicWALL Content Filtering Service (CFS), which
delivers unequalled content/URL filtering enforcement,
giving organizations control over the websites that
employees access using their IT-issued computers behind the
firewall.
Promise Healthcare found that the SonicWALL NSA 6600
delivered the security features it needed without the
performance issues it had previously experienced. “The Dell
“The NSA 6600 proved to be exceptionally
easy to use. The NSA 6600 is very intuitive…
everything is easily reachable.”
Promise Healthcare—Improves network visibility and increases compliance with Dell security solution
Comprehensive security to prove HIPAA compliance
Promise Healthcare has established the comprehensive
security needed to achieve and prove HIPAA compliance
with the Dell SonicWALL solutions. “The security services —
intrusion prevention, SSL decryption and inspection, and
gateway-anti-virus, among others — address HIPAA
compliance,” reports Moch. “Dell SonicWALL provides all
these features in one device, which is absolutely fantastic.”
SonicWALL NSA 6600 is the perfect match for us,” says Moch.
“It gives us a stable platform. We don’t have to worry that if we
turn on the intrusion prevention, traffic is going to slow down.”
Moreover, he adds, the NSA 6600 proved to be exceptionally
easy to use. “The NSA 6600 is very intuitive. Once we log in to
the dashboard and then log in to the device, everything is
easily reachable. Nothing could be simpler than it is — just a
few clicks and you’re in the right place.”
Strong network visibility
To manage the NSA 6600 firewalls, Promise Healthcare also
invested in the Dell SonicWALL Global Management System
(GMS). GMS extends SonicWALL security products and
services to optimize network security monitoring, enhance
network security reporting and manage growth. “With GMS
being visual like it is, we can see everything in the charts and
can pull the reports literally within seconds,” says Moch.
Intrusion prevention, SSL
decryption and inspection,
and gateway-anti-virus
capabilities in one device
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BYOD capabilities that help doctors work remotely
Promise Healthcare plans to establish a bring-your-own-
device (BYOD) policy that complies with HIPAA
requirements. “With the Dell solutions, we were able to start
with the next-generation firewall to get the security we
need, and then build on top of it, adding BYOD and other
security features as we go,” explains Moch. “For instance,
the SonicWALL Mobile Connect app will allow us to give
doctors secure access to our internal medical application so
they will be able to work practically from anywhere. They
will be able to see lab results or other patient information
from the outside, in a secure and compliant way.”
Promise Healthcare—Improves network visibility and increases compliance with Dell security solution
Security reports
available in seconds
Proactive protection
Promise Healthcare is now able to be proactive about
most security issues. “With the strong and secure firewalls
in place, our end-user support no longer has to deal with
many threats getting through,” says Moch.
Moreover, Promise Healthcare can update its application
controls immediately when new security weaknesses are
discovered. “We can now monitor application flow in real
time to see which applications are being used, and
implement policy on the fly to block applications that
pose security risks,” explains Moch. “For instance, if we
see that someone is using public cloud file sharing and
storing solutions, which is a major concern for healthcare
organizations because it risks exposure of PHI, we can
immediately block that application.”
35 percent faster system performance
The organization is also experiencing better performance.
“We’re more productive because people can access their
applications quicker and easier. System performance is 35
percent faster than with our previous solution,” says Moch.
Additionally, Promise Healthcare has better visibility into
network usage. “We can anticipate our future needs with
the great visibility that Dell SonicWALL provides,” explains
Moch. “For example, when we bring another facility into
our organization, we can evaluate whether we need to add
more bandwidth.”
Easy ability to achieve HIPAA compliance
35 percent faster
system performance
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Small hospital, sophisticated solution Comanche County Medical Center
When your IT department has only three people to support the IT needs of an entire hospital, the stress can be
off the charts. “We feel the weight of the hospital on our shoulders,” says Ismelda Garza, CIO of Comanche
County Medical Center, a 25-bed critical-access hospital in Comanche, Texas.
Perhaps the most stressful part of the small IT team’s work is supporting the hospital’s MEDITECH Healthcare
Information System, used by more than 100 physicians, nurses and administrative staff every day. “Our MEDITECH
system is a critical part of daily life at the hospital,” Garza says. “There is constant pressure to make sure it is
always available so patient records can be accessed.” That pressure was compounded when Comanche needed
to upgrade to the latest MEDITECH software version so it could demonstrate compliance with the Centers for
Medicare and Medicaid Services Meaningful Use Criteria. “We needed to implement MEDITECH’s Meaningful Use
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“Dell was very helpful. There were only two
of us on staff at the time, and we really relied
on Dell and their expertise.”
priority pack, which would require the purchase of
additional servers to support it,” Garza says. “But with a
small staff, it was exceedingly difficult to continue to
implement, maintain and support more servers.”
Comanche also needed to consider the costs of adding
more servers to its data center. “Costs are always a factor
for a small critical-access hospital,” says Garza. To solve
the challenge of upgrading to the latest MEDITECH version
and refreshing the organization’s existing MEDITECH
servers, Comanche decided to explore the possibility of a
hosted cloud-based solution.
Hosted private cloud solution meets hospital’s needs
After searching for a managed solution, Comanche
discovered the Dell MSite MEDITECH Hosting Solution.
With MSite, Dell hosts MEDITECH applications for
customers in a secure, state-of-the-art private cloud
while offering technical support and maintenance for a
predictable monthly fee. “We liked the idea of having our
MEDITECH servers managed for us, and knowing that our
MEDITECH solution
implemented and
supported by just
three people
Comanche County Medical Center—Improves security, compliance, and business continuity
patient health information would be more secure made the
decision to go with Dell an easy one,” says Garza.
MSite also gives customers assistance in upgrading to the
latest versions of the software, as well as disaster recovery
capabilities. “The disaster recovery piece was an added bonus
for us, because we were backing up data on tape, but we
needed a more secure, off-site solution,” Garza says.
Comanche worked directly with Dell Deployment Services to
set up the MSite solution and ensure that the hospital
migrated smoothly to the latest MEDITECH version. “Dell was
very helpful. There were only two of us on staff at the
time, and we really relied on Dell and their expertise to
get us where we needed to be,” says Garza. Using MSite,
Comanche has eliminated the upfront investment and
continuing maintenance costs of running its MEDITECH
platform on-site at the organization’s data center.
Latest MEDITECH system upgraded quickly
Comanche was able to upgrade quickly using the Dell
MSite solution. “It was so fast and easy for us to get onto
the newest version of MEDITECH by going with Dell
MSite,” says Garza. “We couldn’t have implemented and
supported it ourselves as efficiently, with just three
people on staff. And we didn’t need to deploy several
new servers, which saves us money.”
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Comanche will now be able to show Meaningful Use
compliance. “We are required to demonstrate
Meaningful Use, and in order to help achieve that, we
had to upgrade to MEDITECH’s current priority pack,”
says Garza. “Dell MSite made that move simple.”
A deeper focus on end users and improved security
Because Comanche no longer needs to manage and
maintain internal MEDITECH servers, the small IT staff
can offer more assistance to end users. “We don’t have
to worry about uptime or server maintenance for
MEDITECH anymore,” says Garza. “Now we can focus on
building MEDITECH applications and making them better for
our users, as well as completing other important projects.”
The hospital has also improved security, because MSite is a
HIPAA-certified private cloud. “It’s critical that our
MEDITECH data is safe and secure, because we’re dealing
with confidential patient health records, and we need to
comply with HIPAA regulations,” says Garza. “Having our
data in the cloud with Dell MSite gives us that security.”
Better business continuity
Comanche now has the business continuity it needs, with the
help of the MSite solution’s hosted backup and recovery
capabilities. “Our MEDITECH backups were not happening
daily before MSite, and when they were getting backed up, I
wasn’t always sure they were making it off-site,” says Garza.
“That kept me awake at night, worrying about the loss of
patient data if a catastrophic event occurred and hit our data
center. Now, I sleep better knowing that MSite is backing it all
up for us and the data is off-site.”
The hospital was confident enough in MSite to move its
picture archiving and communication system (PACS) for
radiology images to the Dell Cloud Clinical Archive. Garza
says, “Even though we’re a small, rural hospital, we now
have the same level of sophistication as much larger
hospitals by using Dell cloud solutions.”
Daily MEDITECH backups Improved security and a better ability
to comply with healthcare regulations
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A better choice for fast emergency care First Choice Emergency Room
In many ways, First Choice Emergency Room functions like a traditional ER, with one notable difference —
patients typically wait less than five minutes to be treated. “Instead of sitting and waiting for hours, you are
taken care of almost as soon as you come in the door,” says Dave Duclos, senior director of technology for
First Choice Emergency Room. The facilities also get radiology and lab results back to patients in less than 30
minutes.
It’s an efficient, customer-focused business model that is working. Started in 2002, First Choice Emergency
Room now has more than 40 facilities in Texas and Colorado and employs 1,800 people, up from fewer than
250 just three years ago. But challenges have come along with that rapid growth, such as a primary data center
and disaster recovery site that were only about 20 miles apart. “That was a major concern as we grew,” Duclos
says. “We knew we needed to build a new data center far away from our disaster recovery site.”
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First Choice Emergency Rooms—Virtualizes data center to serve patients faster, increase system security, and enable growth
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“The success of that virtualization project
brought us back to the table with [Dell] again.”
Deploying a virtualized data center with Dell
To help address its challenges, First Choice Emergency
Room turned to Dell. “Dell had already helped us virtualize our
data center, which gave us a lot of synergies in terms of
security and centralized IT management,” says Duclos. “So
the success of that virtualization project brought us back to
the table with them again.”
For the new initiatives, Dell Consulting Services helped First
Choice Emergency Room design and build a new
virtualized data center in Phoenix, Arizona. Dell Deployment
Services worked with the First Choice Emergency Room IT
staff to install all new Dell hardware in the Phoenix data
center, including Dell PowerEdge R720 rack servers and
two Dell EqualLogic PS6210XS hybrid iSCSI SAN arrays. First
Choice Emergency Room also deployed Dell SonicWALL
NSA 220 firewall appliances at the data center and at each
facility, as well as Dell Wyse T10 thin clients and Dell
Networking AP-225 access points at 34 ER sites.
Data center migration in less than three hours
The organization quickly migrated its main data center from
Texas to Arizona, so customers experienced little
downtime. “We moved our health information system and
other critical systems to the new site and took them online
in just under three hours,” says Duclos. “That’s a testament
First Choice Emergency Rooms—Virtualizes data center to serve patients faster, increase system security, and enable growth
not only to our internal resources, but also to the great
support we received from the Dell team, from months of
preparation to the actual data center migration.”
Faster emergency care for patients
The new data center immediately increased performance
for key applications such as the health information system.
“In our old data center, our SAN read-write times were
greater than 30 milliseconds, but using the new Dell
technologies, that number went down to 1 millisecond,”
Duclos says. “That gives us a better ability to get patients in
and out quickly, which is how we differentiate ourselves.”
Time for a technology upgrade
The organization also had to upgrade much of its aging IT
infrastructure. “We had a system that was designed for 300
to 500 users, and we now have close to 2,000, so we were
putting a lot of stress on that equipment,” says Duclos.
First Choice Emergency Room also needed to make
sure its eight-person IT staff remained efficient as the
organization continued to grow, and that it could more
easily manage the organization’s legacy thin clients and
wireless infrastructure. “We offer free WiFi for patients
at each facility, and if there were problems with the
equipment, we needed to send someone from IT to
fix it,” says Duclos.
SAN read-write
times reduced
from 30 milliseconds
to 1 millisecond
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“For example, we can push out images automatically when
we install new Dell Wyse clients, instead of having to send a
person out to a site to do it.” Also, IT employees no longer
spend as much time on WiFi maintenance. “We can
remotely monitor and manage our WiFi infrastructure with
the Dell Networking access points,” says Duclos.
Better technical training and support
for further growth
The organization will also better support employee
training initiatives in the future. “As we grow, we’re
looking at doing more online training for healthcare
certifications for our staff,” says Duclos. “Dell Wyse
technology has higher-quality streaming video than our
previous solution that will make our training efforts more
effective.”
First Choice Emergency Room will continue to depend
on Dell Support Services every step of the way. “Dell has
so many resources to offer us, from consulting to
training to deployment, and we look forward to working
alongside them as we grow our organization,” says
Duclos.
First Choice Emergency Rooms—Virtualizes data center to serve patients faster, increase system security, and enable growth
Migration to new
data center in less
than three hours
Increased security, simplified IT
management and more efficiency
First Choice Emergency Room has increased overall
system security, because security-sensitive data is
housed in the new data center rather than in each ER
facility. “We have really narrowed the scope of our
security footprint and increased our redundancy by
deploying the Dell Wyse thin clients and the Dell
SonicWALL appliances, and by virtualizing our
environment with VMware,” says Duclos.
In addition, the organization has greatly simplified IT
management, which brings new efficiencies to IT. “The
reason we can maintain a small staff to support our
growing user base is Dell, technology” says Duclos.
Faster emergency
care for patients
at 40 facilities
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Connecting patients and doctors and growing globally Health Net Connect
For many years, telemedicine was characterized by inefficient processes, such as patients keeping a diary and
writing down their vital numbers at home before calling into their doctors.
Health Net Connect (HNC), a healthcare solution provider based in Detroit, Michigan, hopes to change that
with its VideoDoc® remote patient-monitoring systems. “We wanted to combine emerging technologies like
touchscreen tablets, broadband wireless and video so patients could easily communicate with their doctors
face-to-face in real time,” says Corky Davis, COO of Health Net Connect.
The tablet-based VideoDoc solution enables healthcare professionals to conduct virtual house calls to check in
with elderly patients who have been recently discharged from the hospital. Other target users are high-risk
pregnant women on bed rest and heart-transplant candidates suffering cardiomyopathy.
Solutions:
• OEM solutions
• Infrastructure consulting
• Managed services
• Business process outsourcing
• Client solutions
Health Net Connect—Helps hospitals cut readmissions and improve patient care
United States
www.healthnetconnect.com
Country:
Website:
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The scalability challenge
According to market research, the demand for telemedicine
solutions is forecast to become an $18 billion industry over
the next 18 to 36 months. HNC was concerned about its
ability to scale to meet that growth. “When we talk with a
healthcare provider about deploying 35,000 VideoDoc
systems, I get more than a little nervous knowing that I’m
dealing with a tablet vendor in Asia, whose production
capacity is unknown,” says Davis. “Then I worry about having
to monitor the shipment in an ocean container, not knowing
whether the tablets will arrive on time and in what condition.”
After having tablet quality issues, HNC turned to Dell.
“Although we chose it as the OEM for our tablets,” Davis
says, “we discovered that Dell doesn’t just sell hardware. As
a major player in the health services industry, it could
become our strategic global partner. As such, Dell could
help us with so many services and in so many other ways.”
Simplified supply chain and 24x7 support
Although the Dell Venue 11 Pro tablets are the centerpiece
of HNC’s VideoDoc solution, they’re a small fraction of
Dell’s total value to the company. Not only does Dell
manufacture the tablets, it also configures, images, brands
and packages them with the specific peripherals that
“We discovered that Dell doesn’t
just sell hardware. Dell could help us with so
many services and in so many other ways.”
Enables global growth while
saving Health Net Connect
$20 million annually
Health Net Connect—Helps hospitals cut readmissions and improve patient care
A clinic-in-a-box
With HNC’s in-home VideoDoc solution, patients receive a
package from their hospital or other clinical services
provider containing a Dell Venue 11 Pro tablet with Intel®
Atom™ Processor Z3770, a touchscreen and a built-in
video camera, microphone and speaker. HNC’s software,
including videoconferencing, is preinstalled. The solution
also features wireless capabilities. For extremely remote
locations — like villages in Africa, India, and Central
America, where HNC also plans to deploy — the Dell tablet
can be equipped with a small solar panel for power to
communicate via satellite.
thousands of individual patients require. When those patients
have recovered, they send their VideoDoc systems back to
Dell for refurbishing, repackaging and reuse for new patients.
In addition to backing all the tablets with Dell ProSupport,
Dell provides 24x7 help desk support. “We’d have to deal
with a dozen different suppliers to get the kinds of services
Dell provides us,” says Davis.
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The ability to grow globally
HNC can now focus more effectively on global growth.
“For the capabilities and global scale we’d need to take
our VideoDoc platform worldwide, we’d have to hire at
least 200 people, at an annual cost of about $20 million,
but Dell gives us all that virtually overnight,” Davis says.
He adds that finding, hiring and training that many well-
qualified people would take months. “So what we’ve done
is vastly accelerated our time-to-market, shaving months
if not years off our timeline by partnering with Dell. And
that doesn’t include the wealth of Dell’s expertise and
market contacts we can tap into. It would take us years to
develop all that on our own.”
Health Net Connect—Helps hospitals cut readmissions and improve patient care
Gives nurses the
ability to see 20
patients virtually each
day instead of making
4 in-home visits
The VideoDoc package also includes up to 15 Bluetooth-
capable peripherals that patients need to monitor their
condition, including a 2-in-1 blood pressure and
glucometer for monitoring hypertension and diabetes; a
portable oximeter for measuring oxygen saturation levels
in the blood; and an advanced otoscope to capture and
transmit eye, ear, nose and throat images.
On the clinical side is the VideoDoc Doctor’s Station, an
all-in-one desktop PC with a 23-inch screen, video
camera and microphone. From this unit, a clinician can
control a robotic, 360-degree high-definition camera to
capture close-ups of skin conditions or wounds and then
share those views with up to 20 other specialists via
videoconference. All this is transmitted securely through
Dell’s cloud, based in its worldwide data centers.
Re-admissions reduced by up to 70 percent
Big hospital systems have taken note of the solution, with
HNC’s customers including two of the top five providers in
the U.S. These customers are attracted to the solution in
part because re-admissions of recently discharged patients
can cost them an average of $30,000 in non-reimbursable
costs. In fact, VideoDoc solutions have cut re-admissions
by as much as 70 percent, saving these customers millions
of dollars. “And for another customer, one of largest home
care agencies in the U.S., VideoDoc has enabled its nurses
to see as many as 20 patients a day via virtual house calls,”
says Davis. “That’s compared with just four in-home visits a
day, because they’re not spending time driving between
visits.”
Helps cut hospital readmissions by up to 70 percent,
saving millions in reimbursement costs
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