Healthcare organizations have been forced to adapt in many ways to get a solid handle on COVID-19 treatment and vaccination management. The massive undertaking has put the industry through a stress test for the ages, and IT infirmity in particular threatens to turn the process into a slow grind. Continuing treatment during a touch-and-go pandemic while striving for a consistent vaccine rollout requires an effective, consolidated IT model that can mitigate the data dread setting in for providers faced with a formidable task.
Hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) combines networking, storage, and computing into one, all-encompassing system. The hyperconverged model makes use of virtual servers with hypervisors; the Virtual Machine trend is right at the core of the philosophy. Otherwise, the IT scalability proffered by HCI would be out of reach. The increasing popularity of desktop virtualization in healthcare will carry over to HCI model integration as organizations grasp for scaled solutions.
The infrastructure further rounds out an organization’s IT environment with programs for data protection and restoration, workload optimization, and efficiency feedback. The HCI approach doesn’t only do away with legacy and on-site databases to shed dead weight. Low requirements for administrative oversight is reflective of the ultimate goal: to supplement existing IT staff in meaningful ways.
Nutanix’s 3rd annual Enterprise Cloud Index Report noted that more than two-thirds of organizations are rethinking IT blueprints because of COVID. Cheryl Rodenfels, Chief Technology Officer of Americas Healthcare CTA at Nutanix, said, “You have to collect new data and report on your activity every day. You’re competing with revenue cycle, human resources and EHR systems. There’s increased data pumping through the environment, and you’re hitting all your processors at the same time.”
Specifically, due diligence on vaccine reporting is taxing for healthcare system databases worldwide. The regulations for data coverage on COVID are ever evolving and factors such as poor communication with third-party clinics and separate second shot metrics only make matters worse.
Hypercovergence’s past success speaks to its current status as an IT lifeline for COVID data swells. The installation of 5 HP OmniCube CN-3000 hyperconverged appliances at St. John’s Riverside Hospital prompted a 50% increase in work performance. The Keck Medicine Hospital System at USC used 14 storage solutions and 6 different server technologies. Ditching this patchwork IT in exchange for hyperconverged technology led to quicker application response times and reduced costs. With proven results and a model that’s practically a predestined COVID IT rescue plan, HCI methodology will continue to transform the healthcare industry and play an integral role in vaccine distribution and data management.
