BMI Healthcare improves visibility and security of devices accessing the central network

BMI Healthcare, the UK’s number one independent healthcare provider has delivered annual IT infrastructure management cost savings of at least 70% , improved security, automated patch management and increased visibility across its entire IT environment as a result of deploying Desktop Central from ManageEngine, the real-time IT management company.

With 69 hospitals and treatment centres, over 10,000 employees and 6,500 IP enabled devices across the UK, BMI Healthcare required a centralised management solution to ensure visibility and understanding of the entire IT landscape. This means that at any given time, the IT department has the ability to monitor devices including medical equipment across its estate and to administer the required software and security updates, enabling users to continue operating within a secure environment with maximum availability of systems.

Matt Rooney, IT Desktop Manager for BMI Healthcare, said; “We live in an age where technology and Internet enabled devices are now the norm. The global and local healthcare sectors have become more aware of their dependency on IT infrastructure, with medical equipment typically requiring a live IP connection to function. On top of this, staff are using a combination of personal and corporate PCs, laptops, Smartphones and tablets to access our central network and Wi-Fi.”

Matt Rooney continued; “Before deploying ManageEngine’s Desktop Central, we used Symantec’s Altiris, which had a complicated back-end SQL database and required heavy upfront investment from a solution customisation stand-point. It also meant that we had to ensure one of our engineers was fluent in SQL reporting as none of the out-of-the-box reports met our unique regulatory standard requirements. As a result, we had little visibility into the exact inventory of our Desktop estate, which presented a patch management headache. Especially when you consider the number of hospitals we maintain. ”

Desktop Central automates BMI Healthcare’s regular desktop management activities such as; installation of periodical software updates, weekly patch management, delivery of service packs to any Windows-based device including medical equipment, standardising desktop interfaces, administering company wide security policies and restricting the use of unsecured foreign devices, such as USB sticks and portable hard drives. In addition, the IT department uses Desktop Central to audit its entire Windows estate and run the necessary reports to comply with healthcare industry regulatory standards. Automating these important, yet traditionally manual IT functions has freed up the IT team to focus on other business critical IT disciplines and projects – such as network monitoring and security event management. Before the introduction of Desktop Central, these management tasks would tie an engineer up for a considerable amount of time and often resulted in support calls being logged and contractors being hired to achieve the level of reporting detail BMI Healthcare required.

Matt Rooney added; “Effective desktop management is becoming more and more crucial to the entire healthcare industry. The fast-paced environment requires a carefully planned and articulated approach to technological advancements and the ever-evolving threat landscape. As the ramifications of a network security breach can be catastrophic in a hospital, compliance reporting plays a hugely important role in daily operations. We need visibility of what version of anti-virus is installed on every device, which patches are yet to be deployed, the overall volume of devices connecting to the network and who is logging onto a machine and at what time. With Desktop Central we can quickly go from monitoring and reporting to remediation action.

“Much of the medical equipment we use is Windows-based so it is imperative that it is protected against external threats by ensuring a carefully devised patching schedule is implemented, which Desktop Central has allowed us to facilitate. Our hospitals see a large number of patients in a day and if, for example, a modality was unavailable due to OS issues, it would have a direct impact on our ability to operate effectively,” concluded Matt Rooney.

In addition to server and desktop management, Desktop Central now also enables management of mobile devices, such as smartphones and tablets, to perform profile management, asset management, app management, and security management. BMI Healthcare is currently evaluating these features in a trial roll-out.

David Howell, European Director, ManageEngine commented on the move “The BYOD trend in the healthcare sector is no different than in any other industry. Employees want to bring in and use a device that they are familiar with and that also enables convenience, for example, a doctor showing a patient their MRI scan at the bedside on an iPad. For organisations such as BMI Healthcare, it is important that the management of this remains intuitive and user-friendly, and better still that it integrates with existing desktop management solutions. Following direct consultations with customers we enhanced the capabilities of Desktop Central to respond to market demand and to enable our customers to perform both desktop management and mobile device management in one streamlined dashboard.”