Colubris Networks, Inc., the leading global provider of intelligent wireless LANs for enterprises and service providers, today announced that Ramsay Health Care, a global hospital group operating more than 100 hospitals and day surgery facilities across Australia, the United Kingdom and Indonesia, has begun a phased deployment of Colubris WLAN equipment to enable wireless computing for health care practitioners and surgeons at the company’s facilities. inTechnology Distribution is Colubris’ Australian distribution partner for the project.
Ramsay Health Care is well respected in the health care industry for operating quality private hospitals and for its excellent record in hospital management and patient care. The group’s facilities cater to a broad range of health care needs from outpatient procedures to highly complex surgery, as well as psychiatric care and rehabilitation. With more than 8,000 beds, Ramsay Health Care employs almost 25,000 staff locally and operates across three countries. Using Colubris’ WLAN wireless equipment, Ramsay Health Care is making new and existing hospital applications accessible to care givers from several areas within their facilities. The ability for surgeons and specialists to access information both pre and post procedure and while in the operating theatre, significantly increases practitioner efficiency while also improving patient care and safety.
Further, having experienced the convenience and versatility of the Colubris Wireless Mobility solution, Ramsay Health Care is now exploring its ability to leverage this wireless infrastructure to achieve the substantial benefits that can be gained using wireless voice and messaging, staff roaming applications, real time location tracking of equipment and patient internet access among other applications.
“Wireless deployments in health care settings need to be high performing, reliable and secure, and we’ve experienced all of that and more with Colubris’ WLAN equipment,” said Mick Campbell, CIO, Ramsay Health Care. “We’ve heard only positive comments about the new wireless network. Our health care applications, running over a Colubris network, will give our practitioners confidence that they can access the information they need to provide the best possible care to their patients.”
In addition to allowing access to information wirelessly, Ramsay Health Care has introduced innovative new applications intended to improve patient care and safety. One example is the “traybax” program designed to track sterilized surgical equipment before, during and after surgical procedures employing a system utilizing bar codes and wireless scanners. Each tray is scanned prior to the scheduled procedure and ensures that the right tray is selected and the inventory tracking capability allows the surgical team to precisely account for all equipment post procedure.
inTechnology and Ramsay Health Care have deployed Colubris WLANs in 12 different locations to date, including 11 hospitals and the company’s IT laboratory. In total, more than 90 Multi-Service Access Points (MAP-330s) have been deployed across these sites, and each site utilizes a single Multi-Service Controller. Additional rollouts of the Colubris solution at other facilities in the Ramsay Health Care network are scheduled based on established need and budget considerations. Ramsay Health Care decided to deploy Colubris because of its distributed architecture, which eliminates the bottlenecks and performance problems that can occur with centralized solutions. Other advantages were Colubris’ strong security, industry-leading QoS and an upgrade path that maximizes past technology investments while allowing for future growth and expansion.
“The Ramsay Health Care WLAN project is a great example of how wirelessly enabling applications spurs innovation which in turn improves efficiency and patient care,” explained Tom Racca, vice president of marketing at Colubris. “Hospitals are served by highly mobile workforces. This complex environment makes it challenging to provide instant access to the information required to provide top-notch patient care. As such, more and more hospitals are turning to wireless solutions to meet their unique requirements and organizations such as Ramsay Health Care are demonstrating how Colubris wireless solutions, which enable true mobility, are meeting their needs.”
About Colubris
Colubris Networks is the leading global provider of intelligent wireless networks (WLANs) for enterprises and service providers. Its optimized WLAN switching systems deliver unmatched bandwidth efficiency, seamless mobility and secure, easy access for thousands of organizations and 40 million users worldwide. With its “future proof” architecture, Colubris provides organizations with the most cost-effective migration from legacy standards to 802.11n. Its systems unify and integrate with existing network infrastructures, as well as security and management systems. Colubris’ numerous recognitions include Red Herring’s top 100 private companies in North America, Fierce Wireless Fierce 15, CRN’s Emerging Tech Vendors and Mobile Trax Mobility Award. For more information, visit Colubris on the Web at www.colubris.com.
About inTechnology
inTechnology Distribution is a specialist value-add distributor that brings “class-leading” quality technology products, both hardware and software to the Australian and New Zealand markets through its extensive reseller and channel partners. Its competencies can be separated into three primary areas: Security, Management and Control. Supplying through accredited resellers and channel partners via the inTechnology Channel Partner (i-CAP) Program, the company offers knowledge and skill into the supply chain to complement vendors and resellers and thus ensure complete and effective solution delivery to end users. www.intechnology.com.au.
