More Healthcare All-Stars

Introduction WINNERS BY INDUSTRY Education | Financial services | Government | Healthcare | Manufacturing | Transportation | Hospitality | More WINNERS BY TECHNOLOGY Applications | Convergence | E-commerce | Management | Security | Servers | Storage | WAN | Wireless Download complete list of winners John Gallant on being an All-Star

AUSTIN RADIOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION

• Project lead: R. Todd Thomas, CIO
• Technology focus: Wireless - optical wireless networking

When this specialty healthcare provider decided to migrate to an all-digital, Web-based imaging system to serve 65 radiologists at 14 facilities in central Texas, it turned to free-space optics, which provides optical bandwidth from lasers placed line-of-sight from one building to another. Austin Radiological Association selected LightPointe Communications' Flight optical wireless systems, including FlightStrata with 155M bit/sec of secure bandwidth and the FlightLite 100, which delivers 100M bit/sec. With the systems, ARA can expand the business while minimizing infrastructure costs and enhancing communications and collaboration. The firm realized ROI on its FlightLite gear in six months and expects a 12- to 18-month ROI for the FlightStrata equipment.

BETH ISRAEL DEACONESS MEDICAL CENTER

• Project lead: John Halamka, CIO
• Technology focus: Wireless - Wi-Fi-based asset tracking

This Boston medical center is always looking for ways to improve patient care while cutting costs. By optimizing workflows and improving asset management, CIO John Halamka is saving the hospital $300,000 to $400,000 annually lost in missing equipment. He selected a Wi-Fi-based asset-tracking system, relying on location-aware technology from PanGo Networks and a Cisco-based wireless LAN. No longer will cardiac monitors and wheelchairs go missing within the sprawling complex. Medical staff can more easily find the assets. Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center has invested a nominal $50,000 in the technology, but Halamka says the cost of full deployment should reach into the six figures.

COVENANT HEALTH

• Project lead: Bill Dean, senior systems analyst
• Technology focus: Servers - Virtualization, consolidation

This Knoxville, Tenn., healthcare provider fended off a potential $1.5 million data center infrastructure upgrade by turning to server virtualization. IT spent $345,000 on four virtualized nodes from VMware and subsequently has reduced the number of physical production servers by 100 and consolidated 10 test-and-development servers into one virtualized server. Covenant now deploys 75% of its applications on virtual machines, with uptime topping 99%. Provisioning time is down to less than a day, compared with a month or more previously. Covenant also reports capital savings of $155,000 over 18 months.