Leading healthcare organization explores the benefits and challenges of voice-over-Internet-protocol technology.
When ProMedica Health Systems of Ohio and Michigan broke ground on its largest construction effort to date – a state-of-the-art campus at Toledo Hospital and Toledo Children’s Hospital – it also overhauled its 20-year-old phone system, deploying a voice-over-Internet-protocol (VoIP) network.
“We knew that VoIP technology promised countless business benefits well suited to healthcare services,” explains Bruce Meyer, technical coordinator for the voice-and-data infrastructure at ProMedica Health Systems. “We also knew that with those benefits came increased risk of system downtime and performance problems. In an emergency situation, our staff doesn’t have the luxury of time to find another phone if theirs is not working, so we needed an effective, reliable solution that we could manage end to end.”
Leading healthcare organization explores the benefits and challenges of voice-over-Internet-protocol technology.
When ProMedica Health Systems of Ohio and Michigan broke ground on its largest construction effort to date – a state-of-the-art campus at Toledo Hospital and Toledo Children’s Hospital – it also overhauled its 20-year-old phone system, deploying a voice-over-Internet-protocol (VoIP) network.
“We knew that VoIP technology promised countless business benefits well suited to healthcare services,” explains Bruce Meyer, technical coordinator for the voice-and-data infrastructure at ProMedica Health Systems. “We also knew that with those benefits came increased risk of system downtime and performance problems. In an emergency situation, our staff doesn’t have the luxury of time to find another phone if theirs is not working, so we needed an effective, reliable solution that we could manage end to end.”
ProMedica, a not-for-profit healthcare organization, serves more than 2.5 million patients annually with a network of 2,900 physicians. This project features a 10-level, 500,000-square-foot building, which houses some of the most critical clinical departments, including the surgical intensive-care and newborn intensive-care units. Given there is a direct correlation between the staff’s ability to meet patients’ needs and save lives, and their ability to communicate effectively, ProMedica required a phone system that could provide continuous uptime and optimal performance in order for staff to remain constantly connected and able to properly care for their patients.
To avoid causing system-wide chaos prior to implementing VoIP, ProMedica turned to a managed-service provider to help it design a plan to fit its needs. With a goal of deploying 2,000 phones on its Ethernet network, three separate servers already in place (one proxy and two management), and Microsoft SQL Server at the core, ProMedica selected a Nortel Call Server 1000 (CS1000) system, and paired it with the Proactive Voice Quality Management (PVQM) solution powered by NetIQ.
“We needed to mitigate bandwidth, performance and downtime risks so as not to negatively impact patient care,” Meyer notes. “By properly managing our deployment from the get-go, we were able to ensure the performance and availability of our VoIP environment, alleviating many of these concerns. Our proactive approach helped us detect poor call quality from the end-user’s perspective, so that we could count on our phone systems to work around the clock, 365 days a year – anytime a medical need requires communications.”
The majority of ProMedica’s 282 sites employ older telephony technologies that rely on a dedicated telecommunications network. The real-time demands of both voice and data on a single network posed a potential threat, and assuring that the existing Ethernet network was prepared to handle those demands was a top priority for Meyer.
To help determine the network readiness, ProMedica initiated a predeployment network assessment over the course of five days. Not only did the assessment discover and evaluate existing network devices, it also emulated VoIP traffic and modeled and predicted end-user quality of experience (QoE), allowing ProMedica to baseline performance and voice quality on the existing data network.
“Running the assessment and documenting the results gave us peace of mind and the ability to demonstrate to others that our network was ready to support this new communication system,” says Meyer. “We were able to confirm proper configuration of our network, along with our readiness for VoIP traffic.
“Constant performance monitoring is essential for our hospitals, as we absolutely cannot afford downtime,” he notes. “Alarm maintenance is also necessary for our main areas, as well as the various branches we plan to build.
“We currently leverage a systems log with switches that send numerous alerts when events occur – including phone reboots,” Meyer adds. “To help manage the influx of alerts and distinguish those needing attention, we leverage management tools to intelligently determine those alerts that exceed our established baselines. Anything out of the ordinary is sent to one of three IT administrators via e-mail, and they can prioritize and respond as necessary.”
By eliminating excess noise and redundancy with intelligent reporting, ProMedica technology administrators save many hours that would otherwise be dedicated to determining which events pose true threats to call quality and delivery.
“Alarms that we initially set indicated early on that we experienced intermittent call-quality issues when we first deployed our carrier system,” Meyer explains. “With the tools we have in place, however, we identified VoIP traffic problems occurring at a remote site with limited bandwidth. The monitoring and maintenance technology we had in place enabled us to determine the improper quality-of-service settings that were causing the dropped packets and, ultimately, the call-quality issues.
The real-time demands of both voice and data on a single network posed a potential threat, and assuring that the existing Ethernet network was prepared to handle those demands was a top priority.
“No one notified us of this problem and we detected and resolved it before ever receiving a complaint. I don’t believe we could have identified and fixed the issue without any disruptions had we not put the proper solutions in place to comprehensively manage our VoIP lifecycle,” Meyer says.
By effectively assessing their network prior to deployment and consistently monitoring performance and availability to prevent prolonged service issues, Meyer and his team offset any initial doubts raised about this new VoIP deployment. As a result, ProMedica is moving forward with plans to extend delivery of this communications system to its staff of more than 15,000 employees.
By properly managing and monitoring its VoIP environment, ProMedica not only saves time and aggravation in diagnosing and resolving issues, but is now primed to scale as necessary to support a highly dynamic environment striving to deliver best-in-class healthcare services.
From the Catalog
According to www.netiq.com : The NetIQ VoIP Management solutions provide enterprise customers with a unique ability to manage voice-over-IP (VoIP) performance and availability, monitor security threats, and ensure call quality. NetIQ’s ability to effectively manage and secure Cisco, Nortel and Avaya IP telephony allows organizations to address concerns and business risks. These solutions help improve the return on investment of a VoIP deployment.
For more information on
NetIQ solutions:
www.rsleads.com/911ht-205
