enabling the future-ready enterprise in healthcare

April 2015

Dell Customer Stories: Enabling the Future-ready Enterprise in Healthcare

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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Solutions:

• Data protection

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www.oregonortho.com

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Southern Oregon Orthopedics—Scales to meet growth and protect critical data

http://www.oregonortho.com/

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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 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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Learn more about this solution.

Have questions about this solution?

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


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1001001001010111010

4hours

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http://www.dell.com/learn/us/en/70/healthcare


http://marketing.dell.com/healthcare


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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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Solutions:

• Cloud client-computing

DuPage Medical Group—Increasing security, saves millions, and improves patient care

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www.dupagemedicalgroup.com

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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


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


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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Solutions:

• High-performance computing

• Infrastructure consulting

• Storage

• Data center networking

TGen—Accelerates analysis and improves patient quality of life

United States

www.tgen.org

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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


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.”


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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Solutions:

• Network security

Promise Healthcare—Improves network visibility and increases compliance with Dell security solution

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www.promisehealthcare.com

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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.”


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.”


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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Solutions:

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Comanche County Medical Center—Improves security, compliance, and business continuity

United States

www.comanchecmc.com

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http://www.comanchecmc.com/

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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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Solutions:

• Cloud Client-Computing

• Data Center Virtualization

• Network Security

• Storage

First Choice Emergency Rooms—Virtualizes data center to serve patients faster, increase system security, and enable growth

United States

www.fcer.com

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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


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.


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:

http://www.healthnetconnect.com/

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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


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.”


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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