SUCCESS STORY SUNY – Upstate University Health System
Company Size
1,000+
Region
- America
Country
- United States
Product
- Brocade Virtual Traffic Manager
Tech Stack
- VMware
- Citrix
- Intel’s x86 architectures
Implementation Scale
- Enterprise-wide Deployment
Impact Metrics
- Digital Expertise
- Productivity Improvements
Technology Category
- Platform as a Service (PaaS) - Connectivity Platforms
Applicable Industries
- Healthcare & Hospitals
Applicable Functions
- Maintenance
- Quality Assurance
Use Cases
- Predictive Maintenance
- Remote Asset Management
Services
- Cloud Planning, Design & Implementation Services
- System Integration
About The Customer
SUNY Upstate Medical University in Syracuse, NY, is the only academic medical center in central New York. The affiliated Upstate University Health System serves 1.8 million people, often the most seriously ill and injured, and includes two hospitals and numerous satellite sites. The health system decided to adopt electronic health records (EHR) three and a half years ago. They chose the Epic solution from Epic Systems Corporation as its EHR software, and runs it as a server-based, Citrix-published application. Upstate has more than 30 Citrix servers with Epic Hyperspace applications installed. End users go to any web browser and launch the Epic Hyperspace application, which then links to a variety of Epic auxiliary applications. Epic is, by far, the health system’s most widely used application, with between 2,700 and 3,500 concurrent users depending on the time of day.
The Challenge
SUNY Upstate Medical University in Syracuse, NY, is the only academic medical center in central New York. The affiliated Upstate University Health System serves 1.8 million people, often the most seriously ill and injured, and includes two hospitals and numerous satellite sites. Three and a half years ago Upstate University Health System decided to adopt electronic health records (EHR). Chris Loughlin, Citrix certified administrator and Epic Client Systems Manager, was brought in along with two others to manage the Windows and Citrix infrastructure for the project. Upstate chose the Epic solution from Epic Systems Corporation as its EHR software, and runs it as a server-based, Citrix-published application. Upstate has more than 30 Citrix servers with Epic Hyperspace applications installed. End users go to any web browser and launch the Epic Hyperspace application, which then links to a variety of Epic auxiliary applications. “Epic is, by far, the health system’s most widely used application, with between 2,700 and 3,500 concurrent users depending on the time of day,” Loughlin explains. According to Loughlin, Epic requires load balancing – to handle the load as more people come online, to allow updates without affecting users, and to balance the traffic among Epic’s front-end and auxiliary applications. Epic Systems leaves the choice of the load balancer up to its customers. At the same time, New York State provided funding for green initiatives, which led Upstate to decide to virtualize as much of the EHR system as possible, including load balancing.
The Solution
Loughlin considered two load balancing solutions: Citrix NetScaler and Brocade Virtual Traffic Manager virtual application delivery controller (ADC). He chose the Brocade Virtual Traffic Manager for a number of reasons. First, the Brocade Virtual Traffic Manager (then called Zeus Traffic Manager) was already being used successfully by the health system’s Radiology department. “The fact that they spoke highly of it was important in the selection process,” Loughlin notes. Second, the Brocade solution cost less than the Citrix option. Loughlin also appreciated that, as a virtual appliance, the Brocade Virtual Traffic Manager complied with his state’s green initiatives, and it fit nicely into the health system’s VMware environment. Another advantage with the Brocade Virtual Traffic Manager was that he could have load balancing up and running much sooner than if he had to order and install a physical appliance. In fact, it took less than a week to get it into production – from the time Loughlin downloaded the Brocade Virtual Traffic Manager files to when it was load balancing the first application, the Citrix web interface. Since then Loughlin has added the other Epic applications to the load balancer, for a total of about 15 applications in all. “Adding applications is quick and easy,” he says. So easy a few of his colleagues use Brocade to load balance non-Epic applications. “Our use of the Brocade Virtual Traffic Manager has grown, but I feel like we’re not really taxing it at all,” Loughlin adds.
Operational Impact
Quantitative Benefit
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