TELEHEALTH & WIRELESS COMMUNICATIONS
No strings attached hospitals go wireless
Sean Larner, VP of International at Xirrus explains more about the use of wireless technology at Bedford Hospital. T
he term BYOD is one of the latest to occupy the minds of many involved in managing
IT across the country’s hospitals. It stands for ‘bring your own device’, and as the name suggests BYOD refers to the growing number of people in the UK who would rather use their own laptop, iPhone, iPad and so on, than the equipment their employer provides.
It wouldn’t have happened a few years ago, but these days the gadgets people buy for home use frequently outpace the equivalents they are using at work – whether it’s a faster processor, more memory, a better screen or that it’s simply easier to live with – and more people now expect to be able to use their personally- owned gadgets and devices for work.
Apart from that, it simply couldn’t have happened prior to the development of robust, high-availability wireless internet connections. Bedford Hospital is one example of how this trend is making its presence felt in the health sector, and how it is bringing about a series of significant advantages.
Bedford Hospital’s CIO Mark Austin explained: “We were a greenfield site, so this has been our first use of wireless technology here. Phase one has been to make it available in all the main clinical areas. Eventually we want it in all the meeting rooms too.
“We realised wireless would make it possible
for clinicians and other administrative staff to have access to the clinical data they need to be able to work more effectively. For example, for doctors to be able to access patient test results, or look up x-rays, while doing ward rounds.”
Bedford Hospital now has laptops available for ward rounds, which are mounted on wheeled trollies to make easy to take them from one ward to another, down long corridors, and so on. The laptops are always connected to the hospital’s IT systems via the wireless connection.
The beauty of the Xirrus Wireless Array is that fewer wireless access points are needed, which in turn reduces the amount of cabling and wiring required throughout the hospital. In Bedford’s case, this is of particular interest. It also takes advantage of the full spectrum of 2.4GHz and 5GHz, having the ability to operate on frequencies that avoid interference with any existing, older equipment. Furthermore, it can offer a strong, reliable connection to allow voice calls to be made via computers connected to the wireless network, bypassing the traditional phone system and offering potentially significant cost savings.
“In a building this age and style, where much of it dates back to the Victorian era and where it is simply not possible to drill holes, install cabling, fix trunking to walls and so on, you have to work with the building when installing anything new,” Austin said. “It’s
an ethos seen throughout the hospital, such as in the new modular operating theatre that has been installed. It helps make the most of the limited space available by adapting to its surroundings.”
It is also possible to use radio-frequency identification (or RFID) technology, like the kind some shops use to keep track of stock, to tag items of hospital equipment and have them connected to the network.
This means that hospital staff can locate a piece of equipment by looking it up from a computer screen or on a mobile device, thereby saving time at often crucial moments.
These are not predictions of a world way off in the future. Hospitals such as the Liverpool Women’s NHS Foundation Trust are already using Xirrus’ high-performance wireless networking to enable e-prescribing, connected bedside carts, and laptops for ward rounds to improve clinical outcomes as well as enable doctors to work more easily and more flexibly.
Sean Larner FOR MORE INFORMATION
T: +44 1727 846 585 E:
contact@xirrus.com W:
www.xirrus.com
national health executive Jul/Aug 12 | 41
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