Qwest lights up Colorado's Health Information Network

Qwest's latest deal to provide the Colorado Hospital Association and the Colorado Behavioral Healthcare Council with high speed network services illustrates how big a market health care is for service providers. Building this network, which will link 400 of the state's urban and rural health care providers and provide access to telemedicine, will help advance Colorado's goal of expanding broadband communications to rural hospitals throughout Colorado.

When the new Colorado Telehealth Network is completed 400 hospitals, clinics and other health care and behavioral health providers in Colorado will be able to get access to Qwest's optical and Etherent network capabilities. The network will provide rural area patients long distance medical care with speeds of up to 100 Mbps. In many cases, telemedicine can provide patients access to necessary medical care and consultation directly from their home. What's more, intensive care providers can leverage the network to monitor critically ill patients via video conferencing even if they are hundreds of miles away from a medical site. 

"Too many rural communities are isolated from many of the advanced diagnosis and treatment technologies available in urban areas," said CHA President and CEO Steven J. Summer in a press release. "The Colorado Telehealth Network, when implemented, will enable Coloradans to receive the right care, at the right place and at the right time."

For more:
- see the release here

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