How mobile connectivity at hospitals is improving patient and provider experiences

AT&T has always focused on pushing the realm of what’s possible and using connectivity to improve the world around us.

One way we do that is by improving the experience at important community institutions like hospitals, which are going through a remarkable digital transformation just like the rest of the world. Hospitals are full of new devices and software ready to improve patient experiences and care – but to do so, they need secure, reliable, and scalable connectivity that can support those cutting-edge capabilities.

That’s where my team comes in. Across the country, we are helping hospitals modernize their wireless networks with next-generation technology that helps bring patients and providers closer together. We spend most of our time talking to hospital CIOs about the types of health care innovation they’re trying to unlock – so let me tell you what we’re hearing from them.

Let’s start here: Hospital staff are tired of relying on bulky workstations to access their patients’ medical records – especially since those machines’ long log-in times distract doctors and nurses from being able to interact with patients. To solve for this, we’ve helped hospitals transition to smartphones and tablets that have electronic health records apps containing the information they need.

Of course, this requires a steady and reliable connection – especially since providers also use those tablets to monitor care updates, schedules for rounds, patients’ pain levels, and other important information. And those same devices also display high-resolution medical imaging, which can require a high-performance connection to load – but it can be easy for Wi-Fi to lag as it gets overloaded with different applications.

People, though, aren’t the only things that move – the same goes for medical carts stocked with supplies, medications and life-saving equipment. Hospital staff need to move these throughout the building as they go from patient to patient – but as they do so, they get handed off from Wi-Fi access point to Wi-Fi access point, which causes authentication issues for some medical applications while doctors are trying to take patient notes. Not very seamless.

Our 5G connectivity helps solve for these pain points. It’s designed to process data closer to the user instead of at distant servers and effectively puts more computing power in the hospitals’ hands – a particularly useful development as hospitals look to leverage the capabilities of artificial intelligence. Hospitals across the country, including Children’s Health℠, the leading pediatric health care system in North Texas, are turning to 5G to enhance quality of care, patient safety, and communication.

We also provide the only nationwide platform dedicated to first responders – FirstNet®, Built with AT&T. With FirstNet, emergency department doctors and nurses have access to always-on priority and preemption across Band 14 and all AT&T commercial bands, meaning that caretakers can stay connected when it matters most. Reliable, unthrottled connectivity can help hospital staff save lives.

In addition to supporting life-saving care and applications, 5G gives hospitals heightened security through enhanced levels of encryption. And it helps hospitals separate enterprise and patient traffic, as well as data sent by connected devices – the influx of which creates many new endpoints and can represent new threat planes.

But the most exciting applications for 5G may be the next-generation applications they enable. Picture a hospital in the not-too-distant future with wheelchairs, gurneys, robots and other infrastructure that moves autonomously throughout the building – such a system requires low-latency connections that enable those devices to turn or stop on a dime.

These ultra-responsive connections are exactly what 5G provides. And it’s the same level of service that’s required for augmented and virtual reality technology that’s starting to change the healthcare landscape. AR/VR can be used for a range of use cases like training clinicians or as therapy tool for patients – something we’re already enabling in partnership with Mynd Immersive therapeutics for older adults.

Ultimately, this is the kind of technology that can make a real difference for people, whether they be health care providers or visiting patients. And while I love getting into the technical weeds as much as anyone in the wireless business, these real-world experiences are what we care about most.