1

Virtually perfect - the way forward for Primary Care Computing

Mark Gibbs, Head of Primary Care

mark.gibbs@isoftplc.com

2

Virtualisation – The Background

Virtualisation started with Mainframes in the 1960’s

Concept was to split the computer into a number of Virtual machines

PC’s are now powerful enough to handle multiple tasks

VMWare is the market leader for Windows based technologies

3

Virtualisation – The Background

The market trend has seen a accelerating move from Mainframes through to client server relationships and now moving on towards virtualisation

4

So what is Virtualisation?

Traditionally each Machine whether a server or PC runs an operating system and a set of applications

5

So what is Virtualisation?

Virtualisation adds a new layer to the machine meaning it can run multiple operating systems

6

So what is Virtualisation?

From the users perspective this is no different to connecting to a physical server

7

Secure and sharing at the same time

Although there can be many instances of virtual machines on a single server, they are separated from each other and protected from each other

8

Benefits of Virtualisation

Simplified server management – encapsulation

9

Hardware Independent Moving a server on to a virtual server is not reliant on the hardware, the

virtual server is independent of the physical hardware

The virtual machine can have a virtual server installation that was previously a Dell server running on the same machine as one which was a HP server etc.

10

Virtualisation Implementation in the business

The Virtualisation Process takes a dynamic mapping of the resources required by the business

The result is an easier to manage, more efficient, more responsive service

11

Virtualisation Solutions

There are different models that can be implemented

12

Virtualisation is well established

13

How can this affect the future of Primary Care

Typically in a Primary Care setting a GP Practice will have a server and client PC’s all housed within the physical building

Virtualisation can replace the physical servers

with virtual servers

14

Benefits of Virtualisation

The virtual servers can be hosted in a resilient data centre

Load balancing on the data centre manages the utilisation – providing extra resources when needed, no more slow practices because a report is run

Even though this is a data centre housed environment the practices data is protected from other virtual servers – The practice ‘own’ their own virtual server and the clinical database

Back ups and updates to software are a managed service reducing administration costs for the practice.

Technology refreshes are not required at the practise for servers, reducing the cost of the provision to the PCT’s

Using thin client technology i.e. Citrix allows the virtual server to provide services over N3 with very small bandwidth requirements

15

Benefits of Virtualisation

Best of both worlds – the practise own and can administer the server as if it was in their own cupboard and yet it benefits from the same resilience and availability of a data centre hosted enterprise solution.

Moving to a virtual server is not a complicated data migration, the same software runs on the virtual server as ran on the practice based server, it is only the location of the server that changes

16

Theory or Reality

This might all sound really interesting but does it really exist

Virtualisation is already been utilised at large organisations

iSOFT are introducing this as their hosted solution under GPSoC

17

Synergy running on a Virtual Server

This will be hopefully the most boring demo you will see and yet the most powerful.

I will connect to Synergy from my desktop that is running on the virtual server and the software you will see is…..

18

Synergy running on a Virtual Server

This will be hopefully the most boring demo you will see and yet the most powerful.

I will connect to Synergy from my desktop that is running on the virtual server and the software you will see is…..

Synergy – exactly as it looks now. There is no difference!

19

Changes that will be made

There are changes that will have to be made, Synergy printing for instance

New services as standard –

• iSOFT are looking to have the best of breed 3rd party applications as the ‘core’ software under the Virtual Synergy service, we need to come to an agreement with the 3rd parties, but we would look to use Frontdesk as the appointments system and have a built in Scanning solution.

• Other 3rd party products can still be installed and run on the Virtual Server, just as they do now, we will not restrict you from what you run and when.

20

What are the draw backs?

You lose the enjoyment of changing back up tapes

You can’t use the server running slow as an excuse to go home and do that tomorrow. The availability and performance are guaranteed by our contract with CfH

You don’t decide when upgrades are performed we do them all overnight when software updates are available

21

Questions?