Healthcare provider embraces wireless technologies to improve patient care and staff efficiency

Corning MobileAccess, a global provider of enterprise wireless solutions, today announced that St. Joseph Mercy Oakland, a leading health care provider in Pontiac, Mich., has enhanced its wireless capabilities through the deployment of a Corning MobileAccess distributed antenna system (DAS).

A subsidiary of Trinity Health, St. Joseph Mercy Oakland is a 443-bed comprehensive, community and teaching hospital. It has served Pontiac and the surrounding communities for more than 80 years and in recent years completed a $54.5 million expansion and a 55,000-square-foot surgical center.

While hospital decision-makers recognized the growing desire of staff, visitors and patients to use their smart phones indoors, they also saw the potential of wireless for patient care. From electronic medical records (EMR) to wireless medical telemetry systems, St. Joseph Mercy Oakland understood the importance of indoor wireless coverage to better leverage emerging health care technology. So, it enlisted RF Connect and Corning MobileAccess, to ensure that hospital facilities could meet the demands of these new solutions without impacting existing operations or staff and patient safety.

To best meet the hospital's requirements, RF Connect recommended the MobileAccess2000 DAS, a multi-carrier, multi-service indoor wireless platform. Not only could the MobileAccess2000 support existing wireless services like 2G and 3G, it would also meet the needs of emerging services, like 4G LTE, to ensure that St. Joseph Mercy Oakland remained future-proofed in the wireless world. Also unique to the MobileAccess2000 was its modular architecture which simplifies the addition of services or carriers, minimizing the risks hospital construction projects pose to staff, visitors and patients.

The enhanced wireless footprint provided by the MobileAccess2000 DAS not only makes it easier for patients and visitors to use their mobile phones at St. Joseph Mercy Oakland, but it has also improved patient care. With better wireless access, physicians, nurses and other medical staff can now be reached anywhere in the facility at any time, decreasing emergency response time and increasing overall patient care.

"The installation of the distributed antenna system has greatly enhanced our physicians' ability to utilize their wireless devices in the hospital for text and voice communications," said St. Joseph Mercy Oakland telecom supervisor, Paula Hartman. "This new system eliminates the need for pagers and reduces the number of devices that a physician needs to carry throughout the day."

For more information on Corning MobileAccess solutions, and how they can enable the wireless hospital, please visit http://www.corning.com/mobileaccess.

About Corning Incorporated

Corning Incorporated (www.corning.com) is the world leader in specialty glass and ceramics. Drawing on more than 150 years of materials science and process engineering knowledge, Corning creates and makes keystone components that enable high-technology systems for consumer electronics, mobile emissions control, telecommunications and life sciences. Our products include glass substrates for LCD televisions, computer monitors and laptops; ceramic substrates and filters for mobile emission control systems; optical fiber, cable, hardware & equipment for telecommunications networks; optical biosensors for drug discovery; and other advanced optics and specialty glass solutions for a number of industries including semiconductor, aerospace, defense, astronomy and metrology.

About RF Connect

RF Connect (www.rfconnect.com) is a national leader in the design and deployment of high performance wireless networks. With experience designing and deploying thousands of indoor and outdoor systems in high profile and complex venues such as hospitals, airports, campuses, stadiums, arenas and tunnels making applications such as Public Safety, Two-way radio, voice and data run more efficiently and effectively.

About St. Joseph Mercy Oakland

St. Joseph Mercy Oakland is a 443-bed comprehensive, community, teaching hospital and a long-time leader in health care in Oakland County. Founded in 1927 by the Sisters of Mercy, St. Joseph Mercy Oakland has won numerous local and national awards for patient safety, quality and performance, and consistently ranks in the top 10 percent of hospitals nationwide. A member of the Saint Joseph Mercy Health System, St. Joseph Mercy Oakland is a technologically leading hospital that combines advanced medicine and personal care to assist patients on their path to wellness. With dedicated physicians, nurses and hospital staff committed to providing quality care throughout the patient stay, St. Joseph Mercy Oakland has truly personalized the patient care experience. For more information about health services offered at St. Joseph Mercy Oakland, please visit stjoesoakland.org.

About Saint Joseph Mercy Health System

Saint Joseph Mercy Health System (SJMHS) is a newly expanded health care organization serving southeast Michigan. Health coverage spans six counties, including Livingston, Macomb, Oakland, St. Clair, Washtenaw and Wayne.

It includes 537-bed St. Joseph Mercy in Ann Arbor, 443-bed St. Joseph Mercy Oakland in Pontiac, 304-bed St. Mary Mercy in Livonia, 136-bed St. Joseph Mercy Livingston in Howell, 119-bed St. Joseph Mercy Port Huron, 113-bed Chelsea Community Hospital and 74-bed St. Joseph Mercy Saline. Combined, the seven hospitals are licensed for 1,726 beds, have five outpatient health centers, five urgent care facilities, more than 25 specialty centers; employ more than 14,000 individuals and have a medical staff of nearly 2,700 physicians.

A member of Trinity Health, the nation's fourth largest Catholic health care organization, SJMHS is committed to providing a remarkable patient experience by using leading edge technology in a comforting and healing environment. As a mission based organization, Saint Joseph Mercy Health System provides approximately $100 million in community benefit to the communities it serves each year. For more information on health services offered at Saint Joseph Mercy Health System, please visit stjoeshealth.org.