How wireless LANs can enhance the clinical environment

WLANs deployments in health care institutions offer clinicians opportunities to increase productivity and improve patient care with additional point-of-care access to information systems. However, they are not a panacea. Any data that needs guaranteed reliability and protection for outside interference, such as real-time cardiac monitoring, should be on networks operating in the Wireless Medical Telemetry Service (WMTS) range. The WMTS range, (608-614 MHz, 1395-1400 MHz, and 1429-1432 MHz), was established in 1999 by the FCC as a protected frequency range (in the U.S.) making these products less likely to have interference problems than devices operating in the 802.11 range. Security challenges must also be addressed as each access point is synonymous with installing a RJ45 network jack in the parking lot of a facility and inviting the general public to connect to a network. Also, increased mobility of electronic devices means battery power; thus consideration will need to be given to charging, maintaining, and disposal of batteries. WLANs offer many advantages over conventional wired LANs but they also offer many challenges in addressing security and reliability issues. WLANs are not designed to replace conventional hard-wired network infrastructure; they are designed to augment the connectivity of LANs. Even with the 802.11 g standard, which supports connectivity up to 54 Mbps, large medical image files would not have enough bandwidth on this type of wireless network. Wireless networks can enhance the health care technology infrastructure but proper selection of technology and focus on the security and reliability during the planning and installation is a definite requirement.