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7X24 MAGAZINE SPRING 2015
HEALTHCARE DATA
CENTERS
Hospitals are also seeking more
advanced data storage options as a
way to comply with recent changes
in legislation. Under the Affordable
Care Act, all healthcare providers
must convert their medical records
to an electronic format, making data
center investment more attractive.
Additionally, the Health Insurance
Portability and Accountability Act
currently mandates revised security
practices for medical recordkeeping,
which also impacts the way
healthcare data is stored.
One hospital has furthered its vision
of providing excellence in healthcare
by weaving state-of-the-art
efficiencies into its new data center
facility. CHI St. Alexius Health is a
one million square-foot acute care
medical center located in downtown
Bismarck, North Dakota. The 306-
bed facility offers a full line of
inpatient and outpatient medical
services, including primary and
specialty physician clinics, home
health, and hospice services, to the
residents of central and western
North Dakota, northern South
Dakota, eastern Montana and even
Canada.
Founded in 1885, CHI St. Alexius
Health began as a small hospital that
operated from within a converted
hotel building. Today, the medical
center supports a large network of
facilities, including more than 30
locations. While the hospital has
been expanding continuously over
the last 130 years to accommodate
more patients and improve
healthcare services, its latest growth
phase included designing and
building the Technology and
Education Center.
“Some of our clinics and affiliations
are up to 100 miles away, so CHI St.
Alexius Health is more of a network
of hospitals, and our main campus
acts as the mothership,” said Doug
Johanson, director of facilities at CHI
St. Alexius Health. “There are a lot of
things happening to support the
data side here, and not just for our
onsite needs. For example, a patient
can get his X-ray or MRI read
remotely from home or sent to a
local hospital, if needed. So, the
activities we do here are very
important as they affect our whole
network.”
DESIGN
CONSIDERATIONS
Mission critical facility managers
looking to build and operate a data
center should consider a number of
factors beginning with location.
While data centers can operate from
almost anywhere, it’s ideal to choose
an area that avoids high-traffic zones,
like airports or highways, and
protects against natural disasters and
accidents, like floods or chemical
spills. Reliable power, infrastructure,
access to water sources,
maintenance points and future
growth are other areas of
consideration for a thorough design.
To offset administration space and
relocate its IT department, CHI St.
Alexius Health built the 100,000
square-foot Technology and
The considerable amount of information generated by healthcare providers—including medical results,
comprehensive health records, private communications, administrative data and research—needs to be stored in a
place that’s not only secure but also reliable. As a result, some healthcare organization leaders are opting to build and
manage their own data centers.