Final project
Introduction
This project documentation provides a comprehensive description of the different element of the project. The report captures the planning, design and implementation of an enhance wide area network for a small dental practice after their restructuring. Initially the dental practice incorporated only three dentists, two dental assistants and one receptionist. It is pertinent to note that they all operated from the same physical location. However, after the merger of the company with different dental practices new aspects have been introduced. The new practice incorporates 15 dentists, 12 dental assistants and 5 receptionists. The organization has five different physical locations. Moreover, the only four of the dentists work in the offices with the others providing services on a mobile basis. This is model of service delivery is convenient for the elderly patients as well as children.
The project is aimed at enhancing communication, connectivity as well as accessibility of data across the different players in the dental practice. The system must be able to handle the demands of all the partners involved. The dentists operating on a mobile basis must be able to an access the patients records from a remote location. Moreover, they must be able to send and receive patient’s records while attending to patients outside the office. The database accessibility to all dentists and dental assistants must be real-time for ease and flexibility of the daily schedules. It is pertinent to note that security measures have to be comprehensively addressed to ensure that the company complies with the HIPAA regulations. The design of the telecommunication network will be done in a manner that the key highlights mentioned above are observed.
The standards for privacy are aimed at ensuring that there is adequate protection of certain health information. Health care provides are obligated to adhere to the rule and implement administrative strategies towards protecting information regarded as protected health information. However, the law should not be an obstruction to the flow of information to the appropriate people to ensure quality health care. Protected information is any individually identifiable health information for example, the patient’s age, health history as well as common identifiers such as the social security number (Sullivan, 2004).
Problem Statement
The challenge is integration of the different local area networks in five different physical locations without compromising the security of the network. Moreover, remote access of the database will be incorporated to allow dentist working at client’s residence access health records.
Software application selection
It is pertinent to note that the dentists, dentist assistants and other employees of the organization will interact with different applications in their daily activities. The choice of this applications as well as the operating system influence the section of the network design as well as devices to be used. The selection of the applications will be based on the end user requirements which include: internet access, hypermedia technology, access to health records and rapid network response to user needs. The key operating systems will be Microsoft windows 7 and Mac os.
Local area network design
The local area network is designed to meet the needs of the users at the five different physical locations of the dental practice. All the computers within the site will be able to access the database containing the health information. A point to point communication network will be established with the physical topology being a star topology. A router will be located at each of the establishments and a local access list created. This access list will limit only computers with the specified ip address and mac address to access the database. However, the level of clearance required for access to the database will depend on the seniority or the position of an individual.
The transmission medium used up to the route will be a 10mbps fiber connection provided by an established internet service provider. The router will be connected to the server through an untwisted pair cable category 6. The maximum length of the patch code between the server the router and the access point will be two meters. The wireless access point will be highly encrypted to allow only authorized users. Moreover, a firewall will be incorporated to monitor and enhance security of the data communication processes across the network. Each of the five different physical locations will have a local area network suiting their needs and capacity (Trivedi, 2013).
The users within the physical establishments will be allowed to access the network through the wireless access point. However, the access point will have four ports to allow the use of RJ 35 connections for fixed UTP connections to desktop computers at the receptionist as well as other network devices such as printers and scanners. For purposes of scalability the access point used will be in a position to hold up to 20 connections at an instant (Peterson, & Davie, 2007).
Wide area network design
The wide area network connectivity will be aimed at interconnecting the multiple physical locations of the dental practice. Moreover, the connectivity of the practitioners working remotely will incorporate to provide them with a virtual office. The selection of the internet service providers to be used by the different establishment will depend on availability of the required specifications as well as the cost implications.
The design of the WAN will demand that all the physical locations have an internet connection of 10 mbps preferably a fiber connection. For redundancy an extra connection can be incorporated to handle instances where the main connection is down. A domain name will be assigned as well as ip addresses. The routing protocol to be used across the network will be TCP/IP. A star network topology for the network will be used. However, servers and the different locations will be mirroring each other to enhance network redundancy and capacity issues.
A web application will also be mirrored in the multiple physical locations. This will allow accessibility of the database through a virtual web based portal. The portal will be used by all the dentists working away from the five establishments. The portal accessibility will be limited for access only by registered mac addresses. This implies that the access list to the servers will be limited to the computers of the dentists only. The mac address is specific to the network card being used and specific to a computer enhancing the security of the protected data in the database. The portal will be provided on the website of the organization. All dentists working remotely will be issued with a simple GSM based modem to access the internet in whatever their locations. However, the modems will be encrypted and will be computer specific.
Network diagram for the Wide area Network
Benefits of the proposed network solution
- Health information accessibility by authorized persons will be enhanced.
- Ensures Compliance with the HIPAA requirements.
- Accommodates service delivery flexibility.
- The network scalable and can accommodate growth in the organization
References
Peterson, L. L., & Davie, B. S. (2007). Computer networks a systems approach (4th ed.). Amsterdam: Morgan Kaufmann.
Sullivan, J. M. (2004). HIPAA: a practical guide to the privacy and security of health data. Chicago, Ill.: American Bar Association, Health Law Section.
Trivedi, B. (2013). Computer networks (4. pr. 2013. ed.). New Delhi, India: Oxford University Press.
