VoIP, network overhaul brings hospital savings, unified communications

If something goes wrong, Ottawa Regional calls a help desk run by Siemens. If the problem requires onsite work, PosTrack technicians are deployed, Sesto says. He's not sure if the new phone system costs less than the old one. The center has traded a flat monthly fee for the sum of dedicated circuits among buildings and to carriers, maintenance staff and repairs, he says.Beyond the flat monthly fee, the health center is buying VoIP phones.

The new phone system can be extended to 15 medical office buildings that are off the Ottawa campus, Sesto says. The old PBXs couldn't handle them, so each had its own small Avaya PBX that is being decommissioned as the central VoIP service rollout reaches each building.

The VoIP system has given the center a new voice mail system that integrates with Outlook so users get e-mail notification of voice messages. They system can also ring more than one phone when an extension is called. So an individual could configure the system to ring the office phone, but also the home phone and mobile. UC features in the system include faxing to e-mails.The hospital is considering use of video in the future to facilitate meetings and is looking at asset-tracking devices that can be attached to hospital assets. So a transmitter on a piece of medical equipment enables the network to triangulate on the device based on its interaction with the wireless networks in the buildings.

The network overhaul was more extensive than the CEO had in mind when he asked for a new phone system, but it's more appropriate to the high-bandwidth medical applications the network needs to support, Sesto says. "The old network was like having bicycle tires on an Indy car," he says.