eHealth NSW has overcome the challenges of adopting multi-cloud services and infrastructure by designing a cloud solution that specifically meets the needs of NSW Health, in turn helping the delivery of improved patient care.
Built as a single, consistent, easy to use, self-managed cloud solution, it forms part of a broader infrastructure refresh program, which includes hardware upgrades for critical systems, supported by eHealth NSW.
Cloud provides scalability and improved infrastructure
Cloud-based infrastructure offerings form part of the eHealth Strategy for NSW Health and will result in significant benefits for the public health system, clinicians and patients, by allowing for the scaling up and down of data requirements, both more quickly and more securely.
Shifting to the cloud also means a move away from traditional bricks-and-mortar data solutions. These ‘on-premise’ offerings are expensive to maintain and require continual management of physical infrastructure. Cloud hosting is more cost effective.
The perfect example lies in myVirtualCare, ramped up at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, quickly, and in response to demand, using the cloud. It’s just one of a number of critical systems that have already been moved across to the new technology.
Provided by Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure, along with eHealth NSW (via a self-managed cloud product), the combination of solutions ensures a safe, secure and reliable platform for NSW Health.
The system allows for less focus on technology provision, helping make sure services are tailored to meet the needs of patients and clinicians. It will also be used to provide several internal NSW Health functions, including the My Health Learning training platform.
Cloud solution to benefit Local Health Districts
In the future, more systems and applications will be migrated from on-premise to the cloud, including those operated at the Local Health District level. eHealth NSW is supporting LHDs to move their systems and applications.
The self-managed cloud solution has already enabled eHealth NSW to scale ICT in a way that is responsive to the rapidly changing needs of NSW Health. It also underpinned the virtual response to the COVID-19 pandemic, by facilitating virtual care and remote working.
Cloud services continue to reduce operational costs, provide opportunities for operational efficiency and optimisation, and deliver the ability to leverage new capabilities and innovate with new technologies, without needing to build them from the ground up.
