GE Healthcare Teams with MobileAccess

In-building solutions provider MobileAccess Networks is getting together with GE Healthcare to help hospitals deploy their wireless services more efficiently.

Specifically, GE Healthcare this week announced an exclusive, worldwide agreement with MobileAccess to create the GE Enterprise Access solution. Combining MobileAccess technology and GEs portfolio of products will give hospitals the ability to use wireless technologies such as cellular, Wi-Fi, paging and public safety radio over a common infrastructure. Deployments are expected to begin in the first quarter.

Healthcare probably represents the truest form of the mobile workforce: caregivers moving from patient to patient, across crisis situations and between departments, says Cathy Zatloukal, president and CEO of MobileAccess, whose customers include Denver Health and SMDC Health System.

The GTE/MobileAccess solution has ramifications for wireless carriers as well, she says. Some carriers are increasing efforts in their B2B sales to better understand the healthcare marketplace and improve the voice and data service packages that they offer, she notes.

A major issue at most hospitals is being flexible according to patient load, and the GE/MobileAccess system will allow them to flex and have more flexibility, says Steve Lorenc, general manager of GE Healthcare. For patients, its a big step for mobility, and mobility for patients is critical, he says.

In Europe, GE offers an application where doctors can use a cell phone to see a patients medical status in real time; that application is expected to be deployed in the United States as well.