Supporting an Emergency Services network
Running an ambulance service that works out of 35 stations
requires substantial communications infrastructure. Aside from its
daily mission critical demands, Mersey Regional Ambulance Service
NHS Trust (MRAS) made a commitment to implement a cutting-edge
network that would offer better ways of working.
That would not necessarily be a problem for a single site
operation, but rolling out a network that covers 35 ambulance
stations across two counties, ten additional locations from
Southport to Crewe, and involves more than 1,200 staff, posed a
considerable challenge.
For the ambulance sector, finding ways of improving cost
effectiveness without compromising service quality is a constant
challenge. With such a large transformation in hand, MRAS took the
opportunity to look at how savings could be made on its telephone
network. A survey revealed that some 40% of its phone calls were
made to people within the organisation. By arranging for these
calls to be carried over the new IPVPN network, internal calls are
now free of charge, resulting in considerable savings.
According to Paul Lucock, “This is probably the first
implementation of its scale within the ambulance service. Now all
our staff have to do, is pick up the phone, dial a four-digit
number and they’re connected.
After several major suppliers submitted proposals, Telewest
Business - in partnership with enterprise network specialist
Omnetica - won the contract. “It provided the best solution for our
needs,” adds Paul Lucock.
Based in Hemel Hempstead with over 1,000 staff across the UK,
France and New York, Omnetica are recognised as experts in
enterprise networks and have partnered Telewest Business on many
large-scale projects.
Implementation discussions got underway in late 2002 and were
swiftly followed by the introduction of an organisation-wide IPVPN
- a Virtual Private Network carrying voice and data over high
bandwidth IP connections. The delivery deadline was tight, driven
by NHS Information Authority funding timescales, however full
roll-out was completed in May 2003.
The Service was able to draw on the expertise of the Public
Sector division of Telewest Business. This specialist group,
comprising Local and Central Government, Education, Health and
Emergency Service teams, was developed by Telewest Businessto help
public sector organisations reach government electronic service
delivery targets.
Understanding the challenges, terminology and prescribed targets
has helped Telewest Business to better support and implement
appropriate solutions. For Mersey Regional Ambulance Service this
specialist support was critical. Implementing such a large-scale
project meant that their IT department would be heavily burdened
and resources were not available to appoint a full-time project
manager. Telewest Business worked hand in hand with the Service,
providing dedicated account management, advice, technical support
and face to face project meetings throughout.
The Wide Area Network capabilities of the IPVPN solution, not
only fulfil the targets of the NHS Information Authority, i.e.
access to email and the NHS Net, but implements better ways of
working and develops new processes through the Service’s
intranet.
Some of the benefits Paul Lucock expects to see are access to
online training material and better inter-station communication.
One way in which the Service has already benefited from the new
infrastructure is through the implementation of a rostering system,
which allows managers to allocate resources as required and
manage shift patterns; an operation that was previously far
more complicated and involved numerous telephone calls. In the
future, other possible pportunities
include patient record access and CCTV.