Sutter Health to assist small hospitals by Using virtual PCs

Sutter Health is in the initial stages of providing smaller hospitals a virtual personal computer infrastructure that will enabling an agency’s users to move from one machine to another throughout a facility, or access data from a mobile device of their choice, like a tablet.

The program, likely to be named Healthcare Workspace, is envisioned to make information more secure while enabling convenient and fast access from anywhere, with the service handling software updates and ensuring participating providers sustain to be compliant with regulations.

The hospitals would amuse the financial savings through reduced acquisition charges and use of desktop computers, while consumers would still have access to their personal computer—now mobile—anywhere and at any time.

“The virtual desktop follows you, so you do not have your own PC but a virtual PC,” elaborates Wes Wright, chief technology officer at Sutter Health. Citrix will run the virtual desktops that will operate on a Cisco network.

If a user does not use the virtual desktop for four hours, it automatically logs out. If during a shift a virtual desktop user unknowingly picked up a virus, when the shift is done the virus goes away because the virtual desktop goes away.

The target audience for virtual desktops is hospitals with 100 beds or fewer that can’t afford virtualized desktop infrastructure or find the suitable IT talent for using the technology.

Sutter Health has opted IT consulting and deployment firm Entisys 360 as the valued-added reseller that will market and run the base applications. Wright believes Citrix and Microsoft also likely will market the product, as well as some health care, operational and security consultancies.

Wright warns that much of the project sustains to be in the planning stage, although October is currently pegged as a soft launch. Sutter Health has initiated reaching out to smaller hospitals and gauging their interest, which Wright says is high.

A monthly subscription fee has yet to be evaluated; when it is set, marketing will start through Sutter’s physician services unit. As part of the package, Sutter Health also will offer virtual call centers.

 

Several hospitals, systems report financial downturns because of EHR implementations

The implementation of electronic health records systems (EHR) on a huge scale has ruined the bottom lines of several major healthcare agencies. Among them, in accordance to Becker's Hospital Review, are heavyweight hospitals and healthcare networks like the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Texas and Partners HealthCare, the predominant contributor network in Massachusetts.

Despite of the fairly generous federal incentives for installing the electronic health records (EHRs) and achieving several stages of meaningful use, undertaking like initiative can mostly pose vexing financial challenges for contributors.

On the individual practice level, various physicians yet feel that the price of the EHR implementation outweighs the advantages. Hospital officials sometimes have the similar mixed feelings. A latest survey of hospital executives by Black Book Market Research discovered a vast majority at financially strapped services and systems regretted the outlay on such systems.

MD Anderson reported a $160.5 million decrease in adjusted income in the 7-month period ended on the day of March 31--a drop of 56.5%--because of the implementation of its new Epic EHR system, in accordance to Becker's,

Partners reported a $74.1 million decrease in operating income for its most recent quarter, a situation it also attributes in part to EHR execution woes, the article reported. Other hospitals and systems, like Sutter Health in the state of California, and Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston also reported drops in income because of the EHR problems and issues.