Gwent hospitals go wireless

Gwent Healthcare Trust has installed a wireless local area network (Wlan) across all of its 63 wards to help clinicians save time when treating patients.

The Trust, which runs two hospitals in Gwent and Abergavenny, is using the network, supplied by vendor Calyx, to help doctors and nurses access patient information via wireless PC trolleys.

The trolleys have helped the trust treat patients more efficiently, says Jon Holmes, Gwent Healthcare Trust's informing healthcare project manager.

'Initially, we looked at the project as a way to help save time for our junior doctors. We have been trained to save any of their wasted time on things like administrative tasks,' he said.

Watching the way the junior doctors worked, it became clear that a lot of time was being wasted collecting test results from printers when on ward rounds, Holmes said.

The wireless trolleys provide clinicians with information on admission, discharge and can transfer information on a patient. They also allow access to radiology and pathology reports and can show trends over different periods of time.

Security for patient information on the wireless network is paramount, Holmes says.

'Information sent over the network is encrypted within NHS security guidelines. In addition, each trolley has a security certificate which allows it to access the network, you cannot just walk in with a wireless enabled computer and plug in,' he said.

All staff have individual passwords and the system times out within two minutes if someone leaves the trolley unattended, Holmes said. 

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