Catholic Health System Chooses Alcatel as Its
Internetworking Partner
Alcatel's Omni-family of Internetworking Products Assist Catholic
Health System in Providing Increased Bandwidth and Connectivity
CALABASAS, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 25, 2000-- Alcatel today announced that The Catholic Health System, Buffalo,
NY, has chosen its Omni Switch/Router and OmniStack products to provide a next-generation data network for its healthcare
facilities.
CHS chose Alcatel for its network to help the organization merge its systems and networks to become a healthcare Integrated
Delivery System (IDS). It selected Alcatel's Omni family of switches so that it could provide a foundation for new enterprise-wide
applications, while maintaining its legacy infrastructure.
CHS's old network consisted partly of shared Ethernet, FDDI and Token Ring and was upgraded to a fully switched
10/100/1000 Ethernet to support applications and segment systems for performance and security. CHS chose Alcatel's
OmniSwitch/Router with its unique user authentication approach and powerful virtual LAN capability to create secure zones
while upgrading the performance of its applications.
Alcatel's layer 2 and layer 3 OS/R provides flexibility anywhere in the network design architecture, while establishing the
requirements for the high-availability needed to support large enterprise networks. CHS is using Alcatel's superior VLAN
technology to improve bandwidth utilization and security for high-bandwidth applications such as PACS and Storage
Management.
``CHS can put high security or high bandwidth applications like PYXIS and PACS in their own VLANs and offer access to them
only where they are needed in their enterprise,'' said Ginger Walker, Alcatel's director of healthcare. ``With CHS's upgrade to a
switched network and these segmentation capabilities, it has the power and flexibility it will need to meet its application and
bandwidth demands well into the future.''
Walker continues, ``When HIPAA compliance becomes necessary, CHS also has the ability to define VLANs by the user, and by
adding RADIUS or LDAP authentication to their strategy will allow them to meet HIPPA's proposed user-based access control
requirements.''
`` Alcatel's solution gave us the flexibility to build our network while bridging critical, older technologies and systems such as
FDDI for our WAN connections between our largest sites,'' said Doug Torre, CHS networking and technical services director.
``We chose Alcatel because its products could address our network requirements in a one box solution, and because of the
tremendous support that we have received from its sales and systems engineering team,'' said Torre.
About CHS
Officially launched in March, 1999, the Catholic Health System (CHS), Buffalo, New York, is one of Western New York's leading
providers of health care services. CHS has more than 8,000 employees and 1,700 physicians, providing care to hundreds of
thousands of Western New Yorkers. The CHS network consists of five hospitals, fifteen primary care centers, nine diagnostic and
treatment centers, two free standing surgery centers, thirteen long term care facilities, adult homes, home care agencies,
counseling services, social service and behavioral health programs.
Recognizing that health care providers must change the way they are structured and the way they work in order to meet the
challenges of the turbulent environment, CHS has recently taken aggressive strides to restructure for service to the community
into the new century. The launching of a new health care system brings with it enormous challenges, both in terms of cultural
and technological integration. Catholic Health System looks forward to meeting those challenges.
About Alcatel
Alcatel builds next generation networks, delivering integrated end-to-end voice and data networking solutions to established
and new carriers, as well as enterprises and consumers worldwide. With 120,000 employees and sales of EURO 23 billion in
1999, Alcatel operates in more than 130 countries. For more information, visit Alcatel on the Internet: alcatel.com
Contact:
Alcatel, Calabasas
Teresa Mack, 818/878-4620
teresa.mack@ind.alcatel.com
Dave Rodewald, 818/878-4976
drodewald@ind.alcatel.com |
