Northern Montana Hospital and Cybernet:
Enabling Real-time Medicine in the Hospital and Clinics
Northern Montana Hospital chose Cybernet as a partner in bringing all-in-one PCs to their clinic exam rooms and hospital patient rooms. The Cybernet
iOne-GX45 PCs wall-mounted in exam rooms have the power and performance needed for the doctors to enter EMR data, issue prescriptions, access medical imaging data, and update records in real-time during patient visits. This eliminates EMR backlog and reduces waiting time between patients. The IT department is also pleased with the superb reliability of the iOne-series all-in-one PCs, and it frees up their staff to work on other critical IT projects.
The Customer
Northern Montana Hospital is a not-for-profit, 49-bed community hospital and acute care facility that feature a 24-hour physician-staffed emergency department, with state-of-the-art diagnostic imaging and electronic medical record services. Northern Montana Hospital was awarded the 2009 Quality Assurance Award from Mountain-Pacific Quality Health. Their administration, staff, and medical providers are committed to delivering high quality, comprehensive health care services to the people of the local communities. Their specialties include Internal Medicine, Family Medicine, Emergency Medicine, Oncology, OB/GYN Women's Health, General Surgery, Ophthalmology, Orthopedic Surgery and Sports Medicine, Anesthesiology, Podiatry, Pathology, Psychiatry, Psychology, and Radiology.
The Business Challenge
Northern Montana Hospital was an early adopter of electronic medical records (EMR), and experimented with medical carts that had embedded PCs to run their MEDITECH software. However, the integrated PC-cart units did not have the power or performance needed for EMR or medical graphics and often required repair. The IT department decided it was time to find a more reliable and powerful
all-in-one PC that could be wall-mounted in their nearly 300 clinic exam rooms, and that had wireless capability to communicate with their EMR system. They also needed to implement a single sign-on software program to enable their doctors to move from room to room.
After some Internet research, the IT department found some PC suppliers who were starting to manufacture all-in-one PCs, but then discovered Cybernet, whose core business was all-in-one PC technology. That, along with the performance specifications and pricing, helped the System Administrator make the decision to go with Cybernet.
The Cybernet Solution
The System Administrator was very pleased to learn that Cybernet had a very flexible demo program that allowed them to test an all-in-one PC for several weeks, so he ordered an iOne-series all-in-one PC to test. They loaded their MEDITECH and single sign-on software, and then had doctors and nurses use it in their different clinics to get some feedback. In the process, they also tested the wireless capability. It performed beautifully, and the medical staff really liked it, especially the screen visibility and responsiveness of the PC for running the software. The Cybernet iOne all-in-one PC passed all of their tests. The System Administrator began ordering the Cybernet PCs and installing them in their clinic exam rooms, as well as in the nurses’ and doctors’ offices and patient rooms in the hospital. Over the last few years, Northern Montana Hospital has continued to order the iOne-series LCD PCs from Cybernet, including the newest model in the series,
the iOne-GX45.
Key Results
Northern Montana Hospital is known for their extraordinary patient care and state-of-the-art technology that helps them deliver that care efficiently and professionally. Their goal was to deliver “real-time medicine” to every patient in their clinics and hospital. To do that, every exam room needed to have the technology that enabled the doctor to enter data, access x-rays and lab results, issue prescriptions and send them to a pharmacy, and record all data pertinent to that patient visit – all before the patient left the exam room. With Cybernet’s all-in-one PCs, they have been able to meet that goal. Now there is no backlog of EMR data entry, and no waiting time in between patients – it’s a win-win for both patients and medical staff. The iOne-series PCs have the power, performance, and wireless capability to support speedy EMR input and processing, and graphics processing to quickly display and manipulate medical graphics.
In addition to supporting the key business objectives for the hospital, the Cybernet iOne-series PCs are extremely reliable, needing little to no maintenance. This frees up the IT staff to focus their efforts on other projects to keep Northern Montana Hospital in the forefront of providing the technology to support state-of-the-art patient care.
