Children's Memorial Hospital of Chicago Installs InnerWireless System To Enable Complete Medical Mobility

Business Wire, Jan 25, 2005

CHICAGO & RICHARDSON, Texas -- InnerWireless Provides Uniform Wireless Coverage, Helping to Increase Clinical Productivity, While Supporting Patient-Safety Objectives

Children's Memorial Hospital of Chicago has installed the InnerWireless(R) broadband distribution system to empower clinical applications and interpersonal communications, including pagers. The hospital selected InnerWireless because of its ability to support a full range of wireless applications via a single distribution infrastructure. The system is a valuable solution supporting the hospital's goal of adopting technology to help reduce medical errors and further improve patient care.

Children's Memorial was among the first hospitals to install InnerWireless, which also is in use in some of the country's most recognizable buildings, including the 2.8 million-square-foot Time Warner Center in Manhattan; New York City's Rockefeller Center Concourse; and the New Charlotte Arena, future home of the NBA's Charlotte Bobcats. Several hospitals across the country are in various phases of installing the InnerWireless system; Children's Memorial went live with InnerWireless in August 2004.

Installed in large commercial buildings, hospitals, campuses, convention centers -- any institution or commercial enterprise -- the InnerWireless system provides uniform wireless coverage and facilitates the rapidly expanding number of wireless applications and devices. The InnerWireless system acts like a wireless utility, supporting a full range of wireless applications and services, including wireless LANs, personal communications services (PCS), cell phones, PDAs and two-way radios for property maintenance and security.

"It's very difficult for wireless signals to travel in a hospital, with the steel superstructure, thick concrete walls, metal-plated floors, and even lead around the radiology rooms," said William Brook, director of information technology at Children's Memorial Hospital. "We wanted a system that could overcome those barriers and give us a consistent, uniform wireless signal and InnerWireless allows us to achieve this result. InnerWireless supports our medication administration and paging system, and our cell phone provider has hooked into it as well. Being able to monitor medication administration wirelessly at the bedside is a huge benefit and allows our clinicians to do more at the point of care."

Children's Memorial installed the InnerWireless system as part of its response to a report on patient safety published by the Leapfrog Group. The Leapfrog Group is an initiative driven by organizations that buy healthcare who are working to initiate breakthrough improvements in the safety, quality and affordability of healthcare for Americans. According to the Leapfrog report, implementing technology designed to mitigate medication errors significantly improves patient safety. Based on these findings, a special Children's Memorial taskforce of IT, pharmacy and clinical personnel was formed, and the group chose to deploy a wireless infrastructure to enable the hospital to implement point-of-care medication administration.

The hospital taskforce determined that monitoring medication at the point of care was required, but realized that placing hardwired PCs at every bedside was neither practical nor economically feasible. Therefore, the team pursued a thin-client solution to be powered by wireless technologies. That's when Brook learned about InnerWireless and its ability to support virtually any kind of wireless device. Brook was intrigued by the prospect of buying a single wireless system that could empower the hospital's medication administration system as well as distribute cellular signals, paging, and even support the building's maintenance and security communications.

"New wireless devices and clinical applications are rolling out so rapidly that even seasoned CIOs are challenged by the prospect of wireless integration -- moving from multi-system chaos to a single, controlled wireless ecosystem," said Ed Cantwell, president, CEO and chairman of InnerWireless. "In no other industry is it as critical as in the healthcare industry to have instant access to vital data and resources. Children's Memorial is an excellent example of how a multi-service wireless distribution system can provide enterprise-wide wireless coverage enabling point-of-care mobility and applications such as bedside medication administration. We are delighted to be working so closely with Children's Memorial, one of the country's leading pediatric hospitals."

InnerWireless Exhibiting at 2005 Annual HIMSS Conference and Exhibition

Please visit InnerWireless in booth #7055 at the annual HIMSS Conference and Exhibition in Dallas,Feb. 13 - 17.

About Children's Memorial Hospital

Children's Memorial Hospital serves more than 93,000 children each year, with more than 320,000 total outpatient visits annually. It is the only pediatric trauma center in the Chicagoland area and is the only free-standing hospital exclusively for children in Illinois. The 270-bed hospital is home to the Children's Memorial Research Center, one of the nation's premier centers for pediatric research. The hospital consistently ranks as Illinois' top pediatric hospital, and for 12 consecutive years it has been named as one of the nation's best by U.S. News & World Report magazine.