Kemper House, a five-building, 55,000-square-foot memory care unit, provides care for 90 residents living in apartments at the facility. As a brand-new facility, the Kemper House wanted to use the latest technology from the beginning to provide the highest level of patient care and safety. At any given time, fifteen staff members are on-site with patients in addition to physical and occupational therapists.Three nurses’ stations are located throughout the facility to tend to medical and personal needs of the residents. Nurses also use tablets to access patient records and business applications while tending to patients. By using a HIPAA-certified application on the cloud, nurses can access and update patient information in real time, so staff always has the most recent information on health concerns, medications and other patient issues.
To provide quality care without patients leaving the facility, Kemper House uses Tele Drs. When patients need to see a doctor, nurse’s wheel a cart into their rooms with video conference equipment. Patients have remote access to specialists without physically being in the same room or even the same city.
Because patients with memory issues often wander and become lost, each resident wears a location device at all times that tracks their location using GPS. The device transmits their location over the Wi-Fi network so staff knows the physical location of each resident at all times.
Because Kemper House relies on latest technology to provide personalized and high-quality care to each resident, the facility’s wireless network must be fast and reliable and accessible throughout entire facility. Although the internet backhaul is low bandwidth, reliability is exceptionally important. Because patient care must continue regardless of power outages, every single AP, switch and computer operates on a generator that backs up all switches and starts automatically after 30 seconds.
Kemper House partnered with wireless professional Rob Mudryk to design and deploy the network before the facility opened. The team selected EnGenius for the network infrastructure because the team leader had a positive past experience with both the company and the equipment. Because the switches needed to go through SFP plus ports, wireless professional Rob Mudryk selected EnGenius 24-port 10 gigabit switches to communicate with the network.
Because simplicity and ease-of-use was a top consideration, Kemper House selected EnGenius EnSky solution to provide a managed and hassle-free, wired & wireless network for their employees and customers. The Kemper House IT administrator was able to plug and play the device instead of spending hours with complex integrations or installations. With the intuitive interface, the administrator needed no technical expertise or training and all software and integrations were automatically installed.
With as much space as possible devoted to patient living and care, the compact size of the SkyKey devices helps make efficient use of the facility. The team can fit the device in small spaces and arrange in the configuration best suited for the specific location – stacking or side-by-side. Instead of causing wear on the cables by falling down like other similar devices, SkyKey’s magnetic backing keeps the device security on the side of the server rack or top of the switch.
The Kemper House team now has a single place to view analytics on 61 EnGenius Indoor Access Points and 8 EnGenius L2 PoE Switches and can perform administrative and troubleshooting tasks on both wired and wireless devices. Instead of having to physically examine each AP when a device recently an issue had, the team quickly identified the malfunctioning AP and resolved the issue. The IT team can now log on from anywhere and see the status of the network instead of physically driving to the facility several hours away.
As the facility continues to operate and care for patients, the team plans to add new technology to aid in patient care. By having the ability to manage their network from a single portal from any location, the Kemper House has the infrastructure it needs to take advantage of new advancements and technology in the future.
