Healthcare providers face the multiple challenges of enhancing patient care while improving operational efficiency and ensuring clinician satisfaction. Alcatel-Lucent offers collaboration, mobility and systems integration tools to help improve communication and save time, leaving it up to health professionals how-and where- they spend their time. 

Alcatel-Lucent says the technology:

--Improves operational efficiency by optimizing clinical workflow.

--Provides more timely care by communicating clinical information to team members round the clock.

--Offers mobile and virtual care delivery environments.

--Reduces overhead paging by using mobile communication tools.

--Enables care providers to spend more time with patients and less time running to the phone.

--Enhances clinician collaboration and satisfaction.

--Enhances patient care and satisfaction.

 The company explains the technology allows caregivers to contact specialists and share information in real time through audio, web and video conferencing. Cordless and mobile phones are used to transmit nurse calls, codes, IV infusion pump alerts and lab values. Nurse call and code systems and IP Touch phones are integrated into existing communications infrastructure. Patient care is enhanced and on-site roaming and remote collaboration in enhanced. Solutions improve the mobility of healthcare professionals by providing cost-effective tools to optimize hospital workflow and flexibility.

Solutions are offered to help the migration to IP telephony, as well as security tools to protect sensitive medical information, says Alcatel-Lucent. Moving from paper records to the digital files presents a number of challenges for healthcare providers. Information systems need to be secure and clinical information tools should be easy to use. Successful implementation should reduce regulatory compliance costs, improve clinician collaboration and enhance patient care, according to the company. Alcatel-Lucent has solutions to share information among physical and virtual facilities in a safe, reliable and timely manner. Alcatel-Lucent says the solutions:

--Transmit clinical information in real time.

--Connect physical and virtual facilities.

--Enhance the security, reliability, resiliency and interoperability of the communications platform.

--Improve the usability of clinical information tools.

--Lower the risk of information systems security breaches.

--Reduce regulatory compliance costs.

--Integrate wireless local area networks for mobile devices and extend cell phone reach.

--Integrate wireless devices such as cell phones, RFID and telemetry technologies into an IP-ready infrastructure.

--Implement a reliable, open and secure data and communications network for hospitals and monitor network and application performance and IP address management in real time.

Healthcare providers, patients and third party payers benefit from cost-effective monitoring, alerts and remote communications, according to the company.

“As the health care industry looks for more efficient ways to deliver patient care, telecommunications technology has made remote patient monitoring (RPM) an affordable option for almost anyone managing a chronic medical condition,” according to Alcatel-Lucent. Traditional institutional care is transformed into patient-centric healthcare – improving health outcomes, clinical efficiency and patients’ quality of life, says the company. Alcatel-Lucent says the TeleHealth Manager offers health care providers a cost-effective combination of health monitoring, medical alerts and secure access to collected data. The easy-to-deploy RPM uses existing network infrastructure and allows healthcare professionals, patients and families to interact with simplicity and convenience.