THE CLIENT
Gippsland Primary Health Network (GPHN) ensures the region’s health system is effective and efficient, aiming to achieve better care, better health and better value. The organisation focuses on supporting general practice and other health professionals through education, training and systems innovation. Key objectives are to lower the prevalence of national and locally prioritised conditions and to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of medical services, particularly for those patients at risk of poor health outcomes.
GPHN covers Gippsland’s six local government areas – South Gippsland, Bass Coast, Baw Baw, Latrobe City, Wellington and East Gippsland Shires – with offices in Wonthaggi, Moe and Bairnsdale. It is one of 31 PHNs established across Australia by the Federal Government in 2015.
THE CHALLENGE
GPHN’s 40 staff service hundreds of health-professional agencies across Gippsland, which provide medical and allied treatment to the region’s population of 255,750 people. Federal Government funding changes in 2015 saw GPHN created, replacing its predecessor Gippsland Medicare Local (GML), which itself had replaced several Division of General Practice branches across the eastern Victorian region.
SOON AFTER THE FORMATION OF GML, THE DECISION WAS TAKEN TO OUTSOURCE NON-CORE FUNCTIONS, SUCH AS IT. THIS WAS DONE TO BOTH REDUCE IT COST STRUCTURE AND RISK, YET INCREASE CORE BUSINESS-SYSTEMS INFRASTRUCTURE.
After initially choosing a service provider, GML then re-tendered for Managed IT services in early 2015, choosing Viatek because of its comprehensive Managed IT offering. In 2017, GPHN re-signed with Viatek Technology for ongoing Managed IT, including full management of its network infrastructure.
THE SOLUTION
Viatek’s wide-ranging, across-the-board Managed IT services include a 24/7 Help Desk, on-site IT infrastructure and business software engineering services at GPHN’s three offices, and remote support to quickly solve issues.
Ongoing Managed IT services include managing backups, plus patch and software management. Another very important part of GPHN’s Managed Services solution is managing the organisation’s assets and strategic planning; this ensures that GPHN has the best hardware and software for its business needs, allowing the organisation to operate optimally both currently and in the future.
To help speed up and shape network traffic flows to ensure consistent, high-performance levels and quality, Viatek also consolidated GPHN’s Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS) technologies; supplied and implemented new Telstra MPLS network; and supplied and implemented a new server environment.
ADDITIONALLY, GPHN NOW ALSO USES VIATEK FOR ITS MANAGED PRINT SOLUTION.
THE RESULT
While GPHN has grown to 40 staff, having externally Managed IT allows the organisation to focus on its core business function of improving health services to Gippsland. The organisation’s IT functionality is handled easily by Viatek, working hand in glove with GPHN’s sole staff member tasked with IT responsibility.
THIS HAS RESULTED IN A SMOOTH, SEAMLESS SERVICE THAT HAS KEPT IT OVERHEADS EXTREMELY LOW, WHILE THE ORGANISATION CAN CONTINUALLY TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THE MOST UP-TO-DATE, BEST-SUITED SOFTWARE AND BUSINESS SYSTEMS.
GPHN has found the Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) seamless and easy to use; while the ability to contact a Help Desk 24/7 means small issues can be solved instantly, with the peace of mind that a Viatek technician will handle any larger issues.
In 2016, Viatek Technology moved GPHN’s server infrastructure onto the organisation’s premises. This has improved user-access speeds in the smooth-running system.
