Having a Whale of a time: how Microsoft's Intelligent Application Gateway has improved radiology in Essex
Downloading digital images takes a few seconds rather than 20 minutes and mobile radiologists have fast, secure, remote access to patient data – now that Microsoft’s Whale Intelligent Application Gateway has been implemented at Essex Rivers Healthcare Trust.
The Improving Working Lives Standard (IWL) is the NHS blueprint for helping employees to achieve a healthy work-life balance.
At Essex Rivers Healthcare Trust, associate director of IT Mark Large and senior radiologist Martin Gould are committed to IWL. They also believe that the mobility of medical staff has an essential role to play in improving patient care in the community.
Therefore, they could see benefits for both staff and patients in having a secure, remote access solution that would enable radiologists to receive images at home almost instantaneously.
Hanging on the telephone
The trust’s eight radiologists manage and interpret more than 163,000 x-rays and scans every year. In doing so, they spend much of their working time on call, providing an expert opinion whenever and wherever it is required.
"The Whale IAG is an easy-to-use, flexible and secure remote access solution that gives health professionals access to network services via broadband from any provider. It comprises a single appliance supporting up to 50 users working concurrently across an 8MB ADSL line."
Until recently, transferring compressed images from the hospital to a radiologist’s home was carried out over a slow ISDN line - a cumbersome process requiring up to 20 minutes per image.The radiologist would then review the image and give a verbal assessment.
But radiologists on call were also often required to drive into work at short notice. Once in the lab, the process of downloading the image would again take up to 20 minutes.
Secure remote access solution
IT security is the key issue for any trust contemplating ‘going mobile’, because of the confidentiality of patient information held in the corporate clinical environment.
“Our main challenge was to provide an adequately secure remote access solution to our radiologists,” says Mr Large. “We needed to give them the tools to work from anywhere at any time.”
Essex Rivers Healthcare Trust therefore issued a tender for a solution to connect remote and home-based workers to its network without compromising data security.
Microsoft Gold partner Eurodata Systems was selected and since it had previously installed solutions based on Microsoft’s ‘Whale’ Intelligent Application Gateway (IAG) remote access technology at NHS trusts in London, it proposed the implementation of a similar solution in Essex.
"The new service allows Essex’s radiologists to use the network day and night to access patient data and email, review computerised tomography (CT) scans, and most importantly, assess emergency CT scans from the picture archiving and communications system (PACS)."
Microsoft Intelligent Application Gateway
The Whale IAG is an easy-to-use, flexible and secure remote access solution that gives health professionals access to network services via broadband from any provider. It comprises a single appliance supporting up to 50 users working concurrently across an 8MB ADSL line.
It enables access to specified information by nominated users as if they were within the trust’s network. With provision for up to 750 users, the service was installed at Essex Rivers Healthcare Trust within four weeks - on schedule and within budget.
Real-time access to PACS
“For NHS trusts, the rationale for remote access is not merely cost-cutting, but being able to offer a better service to their patients,” says Des Lekerman, managing director of Eurodata.
“For the first time, doctors - and radiologists in particular - can now access their IT services from home with the same effectiveness and security as they can in their offices.
“The data being viewed remains on the trust’s network and at no stage is the user able to save data to their local drive. Once the user has logged out of the network, there is no trace of the data left on the user’s device.
“These measures comply with NHS Connecting for Health’s guidelines for the implementation of electronic health records (CfH - SyOp 7.7) and eliminate criminal risk to the trust.”
The new service allows Essex’s radiologists to use the network day and night to access patient data and email, review computerised tomography (CT) scans, and most importantly, assess emergency CT scans from the picture archiving and communications system (PACS).
They can now issue reports outside of office hours by automatically emailing the referring clinician, while sending a confirmation copy to the radiology secretary.
Mr Large says: “The Whale IAG means that users can now connect to the trust from almost anywhere, including third-party networks, because data is encrypted between all machines. As an NHS trust we cannot afford to slip up and we need maximum protection and security in our internal systems to protect patients’ privacy. The Whale IAG gives us that confidence”
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About the trust:
Essex Rivers Healthcare Trust is the principal healthcare provider in north-east Essex. It serves a population of 340,000 people for general and specialist hospital services and an extended population of 670,000 people for non-surgical oncology treatment.
The trust manages Colchester General Hospital, with 656 beds, and Essex County Hospital with 56 beds. It also provides services from Harwich and Clacton community hospitals and Halstead Hospital and runs a range of community outreach services.
Essex Rivers Healthcare Trust is also one of the largest employers in north-east Essex, employing 3,243 staff including 1,071 qualified nurses and 412 doctors and dentists.
Tags: CT scans, encrypt, Essex Rivers Trust, Eurodata Systems, IAG, Intelligent Application Gateway, mobility, network, NHS CFH, PACS, radiologists, Security, Whale