Comprehensive Wireless Solution for Enterprise Hospitals

Comprehensive Wireless Solution for Enterprise Hospitals

How Black Box Met Cook Children’s Present and Future Wireless Needs

Like many healthcare systems across the country, Cook Children’s in Fort Worth, Texas, had been experiencing wireless connection issues for years. Use of their guest network had increased by over 1,000 percent in the past five years. Patients, physicians, nurses, staff and even mobile clinical devices were demanding more and more of their wireless network’s capabilities.

With multiple legacy networks set up across the system using various wireless applications, Cook Children’s IT department knew they needed to find an alternative solution. The hospital turned to Black Box, which offered a single, comprehensive wireless solution focused on coverage, capacity and criticality. This solution was Medical Grade Wireless Utility (MGWU).

MGWU allows hospital-owned buildings to transfer any wireless signal across more than 1 million square feet of the medical center. To Cook Children’s, this made both financial and functional sense. Utilizing MGWU, Cook Children’s was able to:

• Lessen the healthcare system’s reliance on vendors
• Allow IT to introduce new applications and devices without experiencing control issues
• And provide a more reliable Wi-Fi connection to enterprise, clinical and patient users.

“This comprehensive and scalable solution meets the needs of doctors, nurses and staff. As a patient-centric care facility, it is equally vital that this solution meets the needs of the patients we care for, along with their families and their visitors,” Michael Zachary, Director, IT Enterprise Architecture for Cook Children’s says.

Looking Ahead to Future Capabilities

Now that Cook Children’s had a wireless infrastructure they can trust, Zachary and Black Box looked ahead to new network needs.

The hospital next worked with Black Box to integrate nurse call and bedside physiological monitoring alarms in the neonatal intensive care unit. This allowed for nurses to be efficient while providing critical emergency response across an expansive set of private rooms.

Cook Children’s then worked on a clinician-driven initiative, where they were able to increase the use of hospital scanners to more than 97 percent – 25 percent above the industry average.

To arrange a consultation with an expert from Black Box, please click here or email contact@blackbox.com.