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SAN JOSE, Calif. – November 29, 2005 – To maintain real-time communications to critical staff
and employees, the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles chose leading voice mobility
provider Ascendent Systems to implement a voice mobility solution that enables users to be
reached anywhere and anytime. The Ascendent Voice Mobility Suite was
integrated into the hospital’s existing telephony infrastructure to deliver key functionality to
wireless devices heavily relied upon by nurses, doctors, clinicians, and staff.
“The constantly mobile environment of a hospital demands immediate staff accessibility,
dependable wireless connectivity, and high call quality for our staff who are traveling from building
to building, both on and off our campus,” said Furley Lumpkin, Director of
EIS/Telecommunications at Cedars-Sinai. “As we investigated a number of different options for
replacing our Digital Wireless Office System, Ascendent Systems was identified as providing the
most equivalent functionality that our staff uses. Through implementing their vendor-neutral
convergence solution, we can now enjoy the functionality and flexibility of wireless.”
“Certain key features of the product – such as a single number reachability associated with a
person, group or team, get-me-conferencing functions,– strongly influenced our decision to
choose Ascendent,” said Lumpkin. “We also had a short timeline for implementation and testing
of the product – about six months from start to finish – and Ascendent was able to meet our
immediate need. Most importantly, the product proved extremely user-friendly and easy to
implement and enabled the maximum amount of flexibility with the minimum amount of
equipment.” Lumpkin noted the dial tone feature as one of the most appealing functions on the
solution, as he prefers to “pulse” staff rather than “ping” them, since reaching someone live on the
phone can often be critical – particularly in an emergency situation. He plans for the system to be
fully deployed by December 31, 2005, and expects that it will ultimately support more than 1400
users.
The Ascendent Voice Mobility Suite allowed Cedars-Sinai to leverage their legacy
Nortel PBX infrastructure but get all of the easy to use features that IP PBX vendors promote.
The solution extends PBX capabilities to any telephony device (mobile phone, BlackberryTM, WiFi,
desk phone, etc) such as four-digit call transfer, call conferencing, call park, PBX dial tone from
any device, and a single consolidated voicemail. Ascendent mobility features fulfill the hospital’s
dynamic requirements in the following areas: improved patient care due to quicker collaboration
between mobile staff that make informed decisions and speeds communications; and increased
collaboration between colleagues resulting from more reliable and faster communications.
Cedars-Sinai Medical Center was recognized for its technology leadership in 2005 when
Hospitals & Health Networks magazine designated it as one of America’s “Most Wired” hospitals.
It was among only seven hospitals in California and 100 in the nation to receive this distinction for
the advanced use of information technology in safety and quality, customer service, business
process, workforce, and public health and safety.
About Cedars-Sinai Medical Center
Cedars-Sinai Medical Center is one of the largest nonprofit academic medical centers in the
western United States. For 17 consecutive years, it has been named Los Angeles’ most preferred
hospital for all health needs in an independent survey of area residents. Cedars-Sinai is
internationally renowned for its diagnostic and treatment capabilities and its broad spectrum of
programs and services, as well as breakthroughs in biomedical research and superlative medical
education. Additional information is available at http://www.cedars-sinai.org
Ascendent Systems is the premier provider of enterprise voice mobility solutions that allow
companies to be more responsive to customers and crisis by giving them the power to reach
anyone, anywhere, immediately. The Ascendent Voice Mobility Suite of applications
provides single number reachability, real-time notification and conferencing, and voice continuity.
These solutions allow users to automatically extend the identity and functionality of their business
desk phone to any other device. Partnered with major mobile carrier and infrastructure providers,
Ascendent has solutions deployed in Fortune 500 corporations across many industry verticals
including manufacturing, finance, healthcare, government, hospitality, and education. Ascendent
is a privately held company headquartered in San Jose, CA. For more information:
http://www.ascendentsystems.com.
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