HOUSTON, WE HAVE A CERNER ® PRINTING PROBLEM
By Gus Lowery, Senior Consultant
I have a folder called “Re-sends” that contains e-mail of subjects that come
up over and over again. Cerner® printing is just one of those subjects, I hear about
on a regular basis. Order requisitions printing in the cafeteria or not at all, face sheets
pulling from the sheet label drawer, pharmacy fill lists rolling out label at a time for hours,
and the ever popular – “it prints now, now it doesn’t, it prints now”.
While not to be construed as a comprehensive checklist, the list below contains some of
the topics often not reviewed until just prior to conversion. A good migration plan to
Microsoft® 2003 printserver takes weeks and the budget for printers can only flex so far
without good capacity planning. DNS naming standards in themselves often take several weeks (or
months!) to update and longer to alias in the network without affecting legacy applications.
It is unfortunately often discovered or reviewed at the end of the project, when the
clinicians discover that it is impossible to find their printer in the drop down bar. The
resulting database work to incorporate new naming conventions can push conversion by several
weeks. So…start early, create a naming committee that includes members of the
applications team, conduct a good inventory, remember to test everything together or at least
in components prior to conversion, plan for support issues, and always remember that printing
needs to be reviewed prior to go live.
If you would like to read the rest of this article, please visit www.getvitalized.com under
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VitalKnowledge
A MESSAGE FROM THE PRACTICE DIRECTOR
By John D. Smaling
Welcome to the inaugural issue of the VCS Technology Newsletter. Although a new practice for
Vitalize, healthcare IT technology has been the focal point of my professional career; almost
twenty years. After a short time away from infrastructure, restarting a healthcare technology
team has been like putting on a favorite pair of shoes for me; comfortable and familiar.
Our team provides the breadth of services that you’d expect from a technology practice.
Assessment, design, implementation and support of LAN/WAN, mobile health solutions, end user
computing, and infrastructure expertise specific to your favorite HIS vendors comprise the
majority of our offerings. However, we’ll continue to keep our eye on shifts in
technology trends, and the appropriate application of those technologies in a healthcare
setting. In doing so, we can offer the right blend of infrastructure and integration services
to complement the transformation efforts that your organizations have in progress, or on the
drawing board.
We’re different from other technology service providers in several ways. Principally
however, we understand healthcare and the way that technology can complement your
organization’s overall business initiatives in an integrated way. Infrastructure and
integration are necessary components that when combined with people, process, and applications
provide real solutions. Big picture vision in concert with solid tactical planning and
execution get the job done.
We’d very much appreciate the opportunity to talk with you about your goals and attendant
initiatives and the things that we do, and our compelling differentiators. Hard at work in
getting our message out to you is Doug Symington, our Director of Sales for all our practices
including the VCS Technology & Integration practice. Doug shares the team's conviction in
our value proposition and we’d very much appreciate it if you’d give him a small
slice of your time to share that message with you. Doug can be reached at
dsymington@getvitalized.com
or call 610-444-1233 to reach us.