When we let cloud and virtualization cross the threshold our society, we welcomed these two breakthrough technologies to improving the quality of our lives, medical concerns being at the top of our priorities. It’s a good thing that the planet has not only 24/7 convenience stores, but also round-the-clock hospitals that are ready to provide care should an emergency arise. But where do cloud and virtualization enter the picture?

There’s three things to look out for: data management, cost-savings and facilities improvement. Cisco, as one of the leading providers of cloud-based services via virtualized computing systems, knows this very well. Together with the Jordanian Government, the enterprise deployed its first Cisco HealthPresence solution in the Middle East and Africa.

Cisco’s Director for Corporate Affairs, Laura Quintana provided details on the organizations’ quest to deliver quality healthcare IT solutions to regions in Asia and Africa.

“Cisco is focused on working with government and industry to transform the delivery of healthcare through 21st-century technology. Today, Cisco Care-at-a-Distance Solutions are transforming healthcare by providing a new access model that enables patients to easily connect with the best clinician for their specific condition, regardless of patient or clinician’s location.”

She added, “to that end, Cisco Care-at-a-Distance Solutions are directly impacting lives by making quality healthcare accessible to remote, rural populations and underserved individuals and communities. The first-ever implementation of Cisco’s HealthPresence solution in the Middle East and Africa region is a key milestone for Cisco and clear demonstration of our commitment to work with governments, globally, to improve the lives of their citizens.”

This unique solution will deliver the following benefits to the country’s present healthcare system:

• Cisco HealthPresence will allow patients to interact and communicate with their respective doctors who may be located thousand miles away, in a clinical setting.
• The solution is not limited to supporting just one healthcare provider. It can be configured to support multiple locations, reaching more specialists, hospitals and more.
• Instead of frequent tertiary hospital visits, the system can redirect patients to local and low-cost clinics where their concerns will be addressed properly.
• HealthPresence also is a combination of HD video, audio and network-transmitted data that will recreate an environment very similar to what a patient would find in the hospital.

Cisco is not the only organization that is involved in overcoming challenges brought by integrating cloud to the human race’s medical needs. In April, VMware and Dell partnered on their healthcare initiatives via the Mobile Clinical Computing platform, powered by VMware’s vSphere.  And less than a month ago, the Maine Medical Center hit the terabyte-mark with the colossal amount of medical data at hand. They went on to seek the virtualization of storage systems, and are still in the process of a full transfer to a virtualized environment.

Grabbing attention with its commercial potential for healthcare organizations, Essence also secures $61 million in private funding.  The medical industry has also contributed to virtual computer’s growth by way of rapid expansion of client-hosted VDI markets.

Equipped with the goals of eliminating high maintenance fees, revolutionizing medical data sharing and management, and developing techniques, the cloud is becoming an important space for medicine. With healthcare spending for cloud services spiking at a record pace, predicted to peak at $518 million (for IaaS) in 2015, we are now witnessing the rising dawn of Healthcare IT.