The IT major Cisco Systems has launched its Cisco medical grade network assessment programme and Cisco clinical suite in India for automating the hospital environment and to deliver more cost effective and efficient patient care services.

Integrated with the Cisco medical grade network to assess the requirements of each hospital, the Cisco clinical suite consists of four solutions, nurses call, patient monitoring, location based services and collaborative care. It will improve communication and productivity at key administrative points and workflow stages helping to achieve administrative efficiency, staff productivity, cost savings and quality of care, Suprabhat Chatterjee, national business development manager, Cisco Systems (India) Pvt Ltd. told Pharmabiz.

The system has benefits like monitoring patients and review records of any patient digitally, pinpoint hospital equipment with map-based visibility and location based alarms to reduce loss of valuable hospital assets, quick conferencing with crisis management teams, virtual collaboration with other decision makers and consultations with remote patients on mobile devices, eliminating unnecessary work processes etc.

Chatterjee said that Cisco would analyse the requirements of hospitals on a customised solution basis and implement the clinical suite, targeted at hospitals having 100 beds and more. It is different from similar other solutions available in the market and is specifically configured to enhance healthcare facility, communication and productivity. Nurse call integrates with leading nurse call systems to provide real time, rules based delivery of patient calls, clinical alerts and urgent administration information on mobile phones and is connected with special IP phones. Patient monitoring provides access to patient data and records (in text and graphic format), via wired and wireless IP phones and devices.

He said that the hospitals in the west are increasingly moving towards paperless work environment, including physician prescriptions. This has helped in reducing medical errors as data is stored and communicated in digital format from the doctor to the paramedical staff at pharmacies. Digital data is helpful considering the fact in certain countries patient data has to be stored for over seven years. Hospitals are also keen to integrate the advances in IT technology with hospital administration to improve quality of healthcare delivery.

Chatterjee said, “Cisco is in the process of educating the hospital administrators about the product, through seminars and workshops conducted in various metros. Such programmes have been conducted in Chennai and Mumbai.”