Wide-area network connecting a hospital drug informatics center with a university

A wide-area network (WAN) connecting a new drug informatics center in a university-affiliated hospital with the university's campus-based computer network is described. In 1994 a pharmacy school developed a drug informatics center in an affiliated hospital. The center was originally designed around a local-area network (LAN) to be located at the hospital and planned to provide clients with easy access to typical productivity software and various electronic information resources. Only occasional modem connections to the university network were envisioned. However, large price increases in information retrieval systems and decreases in the cost of a frame relay connection (T1 line) to the campus network led to the installation of a WAN when the drug informatics center was established. Technical, political, and legal problems were overcome, and the connection was made. The WAN gave faculty and students at the hospital access to many of the university's computing and Internet resources. In addition, the faculty and students have access to various files and programs available only on the drug informatics center's file server at the affiliated hospital. It cost about $6500 to install all WAN equipment and maintain the frame relay for the first year, or a third of what would have been necessary for information retrieval software had a separate LAN been established at the hospital. A WAN connecting a drug informatics center and a university's computer network gave the center access to more electronic information resources at lower cost than would have been possible with a separate LAN.