If you work for a healthcare system, you know that new digital services – from telemonitoring to augmented reality continuing education – are being rolled out at an accelerated pace. That’s because every healthcare provider and organization wants to improve both patient care and operational efficiency, and they see digital services as a path toward improvement.
However, many of them bump into obstacles at the infrastructure level, and networks are often one of those obstacles.
Digital services come with demanding requirements for network connectivity and digital connectivity (inside a facility, across facilities, across cities and states and countries) often limits or restricts the speed, availability, and value of new digital services. Some of the challenges include:
- Dead spots and weak wireless connections – perhaps WiFi isn’t sufficient.
- Sufficient performance and resilience – throughput and latency from clinic to cloud and back again isn’t predictable.
- Connection problems interfere with the ability to gather millions of data points from sensors (the Internet of Medical Things) and medical records (EHR), cross-linking disconnected data sets to conduct near real-time analysis for better medical, operational, and financial decision-making.
- Too many network tasks are manual, requiring time-consuming human intervention in places (like rural hospitals) where IT staff are in short supply, or in places where necessary skills are lacking.
- Healthcare networks are massive targets for cybersecurity attacks, and keeping both infrastructure and personal health information (PHI) safe and secure is harder than ever before.
These challenges stand in the way of improving patient care and efficiency. To make matters worse, many healthcare providers, organizations, and systems don’t have the right network partners with the right vision, healthcare-specific experience, and innovative technologies to help them move forward faster. When it comes to delivering digital services in healthcare, the right partners matter.
Fortunately, thanks to our experience working with healthcare institutions of all sizes, we understand what they’re trying to accomplish and we’re able to solve their problems. We’re working with healthcare systems every week, applying proven technologies they may not have considered but that could solve their problems such as SD-WAN, enhanced metro-level connectivity for the edge, or private 5G wireless that support and sustain better ways to deliver patient services, improve patient experiences, reduce medical risk and waste, and optimize spend.
In our latest thought leadership paper, Rethinking the Network for Transformative Healthcare, we give you a concentrated overview of what we’ve learned working in healthcare. In it, we’ll explore the trends and challenges healthcare providers face when trying to deliver game-changing digital experiences. We’ll uncover network technologies that solve problems and unlock opportunities. We’ll show you what the future might hold for your organization, and then give you a short view of just how Zayo can help.
To take a look, follow this link.