Simi Valley Hospital Creates New Wireless Environment

As part of its new vision for healthcare, Simi Valley Hospital in Ventura County, California—one of 17 hospitals in the Adventist Health system—recently invested more than $75 million at its hospital with a 144-bed patient care tower that includes indoor wireless coverage.

Providing wireless service inside the building so that patients, visitors, and healthcare professionals can easily make connections to others outside the hospital by mobile phone has been one of the main improvements. With the installation of ExteNet Systems’ indoor distributed network (also called a distributed antenna system – DAS) using ‘iDuct’ technology, the new facility enables indoor mobile communications to keep doctors, emergency responders, patients, and their families connected.

ExteNet’s iDuct leverages the Simi Valley Hospital Patient Tower’s existing heating, ventilating and air conditioning (HVAC) system, by carrying wireless signals through the metal ductwork. Verizon and T-Mobile are already on the network, with other carriers set to provide wireless service soon. Unlike traditional indoor network technologies, which typically require numerous antennas and miles of cabling, ExteNet’s iDuct system uses a handful of wireless probes (small antennas) distributed inside the HVAC metal ductwork. These probes are then connected to one or more base transceiver station hubs, and 190,000 square feet, including the entire Patient Care Tower as well as the Garden Level is lit up for mobile coverage.