With government and patient mandates to do more with less, the health care industry is looking at alternatives to private networks. The ongoing operating costs of purely private networks seem to increase with every advancement in technology.
New applications consume ever-increasing amounts of bandwidth.
Analysts predict, and users report, that VPNs can cut remote networking costs by half-or more. Until recently, patient record and other security issues have prevented widespread use of the Internet in health care applications. In fact, with the robust security provisions now available commercially for VPNs, the typical VPN is actually more secure than the typical private network. Examples of intranets include hospital staff accessing their patients' records from their homes or offices, outpost clinics communicating with the main hospital, and insurance companies creating an internetwork of sales offices. A VPN improves productivity and extends reach with a more affordable, capable, flexible and secure alternative to the typical private network.