Boston Health Care Implements EMC

EMC Corporation helped implement the state-of-the-art datacenter at the new headquarters of Boston Health Care for the Homeless Program (BHCHP), Jean Yawkey Place. EMC’s $250,000 donation of storage systems, software and services will support BHCHP’s clinical and business operations by protecting and keeping its information readily accessible at its headquarters and for its clinicians in the community. EMC’s donation will help BHCHP meet a Kresge Foundation challenge to raise an additional $4.5 million for the organization.

"Our mission is to provide the highest quality health care for Boston’s homeless men, women and children and this gift will help us do that," said BHCHP executive director Robert Taube, PhD. "EMC managed the move of our datacenter without any interruption to our operations and installed advanced data backup technology to support our clinical and financial operations, greatly benefiting our staff and patients."

Founded in 1985, BHCHP has evolved into the largest and most comprehensive health care for the homeless program in the country, delivering services to more than 10,000 homeless men, women and children a year. BHCHP is renovating a venerable old building in Boston that will unite the core elements of its operations under one roof, including an expanded inpatient care unit, primary care, dental and mental health, a pharmacy, administrative offices and the new datacenter.

EMC Global Services worked with BHCHP to coordinate the datacenter relocation and design the new infrastructure, which included provisioning it with EMC’s high-speed data backup equipment and a project manager to coordinate the move of existing servers and network components to the new datacenter.

Additionally, BHCHP relies on its practice management and billing systems, as well as GE Healthcare Centricity applications for 24/7 access to patient information to provide direct care to patients throughout Boston. To protect and make critical information readily accessible, EMC donated an EMC Disk Library (EDL) system and EMC NetWorker software to strengthen, streamline and simplify BHCHP’s disk-based backup and restore operations. Using NetWorker, BHCHP is able to automatically cycle backups to the EDL based on pre-defined retention policies, thus achieving higher performance and greater reliability.

"Manila file folders and paper are not an option for our clinicians providing direct care to patients all over Boston," said Lee Cowgill, BHCHP’s Network Administrator. "Our patients are often on the move, so clinicians need to have patient records at their fingertips. While we have already made great strides with our use of technology, our EMC information infrastructure is a giant leap forward and will be faster, more reliable and more redundant. This gift is especially meaningful to me because I was once homeless and understand the profound impact of our work."

Since its inception in 1985, Boston Health Care for the Homeless Program (BHCHP) has provided high quality health care to homeless individuals and families in the greater Boston area. A private, non-profit organization, BHCHP runs three hospital-based clinics and delivers care at more than 80 shelters and sites including the Pine Street Inn, St. Francis House and New England Shelter for Homeless Veterans. BHCHP’s inpatient respite program, the Barbara McInnis House, has become a national model for delivering medical care to homeless individuals who are too sick for shelters or the street, but not sick enough for an inpatient hospital stay.