Dell Streaks Into Hospitals With Tiny Tablet

Connectivity

If consumers don't want it, maybe the healthcare industry will? That could be Dell's plan, as they plan to integrate the Streak into the healthcare environment. Here's the strategy.

Dave Courbanou

September 17, 2010

2 Min Read

Dell Streak

If consumers don’t want it, maybe the healthcare industry will? That could be Dell’s plan, as they plan to integrate the Streak into the healthcare environment. Here’s the strategy.

Dell’s existing Electronic Medical Records and Mobile Clinical Computing Solutions (MCC) are getting a new little brother; the 5-inch Dell Streak android phone/tablet. Dell thinks it’s the perfect fit, form and function to help do away with “compatibility issues that typically exist between PDAs, smartphones and health information systems…”

Dell is billing the Streak-solution as an affordable and easy to use device that can improve healthcare functions for physicians on the go. Dell feels that the integration of the Streak into their healthcare solutions will eventually lead to convenient access to digital patient information anywhere inside Dell’s EMR infrastructure.

You can start ordering the hospital-branded Streak coming Fall 2010, and it will be an “integrated component” of Dell’s EMR and MCC solutions. Dell cites that 64% of physicians that are already using smartphone technology and that the Streak would find quick adoption.

There’s no word on what Dell is doing under the hood, but they claim that the Streak + EMR bundle makes HIPAA compliance easier, since information isn’t physically on the device, but held in the EMR data center. Of course, Dell is also touting photographic, data and voice capabilities of the tablet as the key features that will help doctors take better care of patients and access information quicker than typically possible.

Being Android-based, Dell thinks it’ll easily integrating with existing hospital systems, along with “Enterprise-Enabled” feature sets, which will help the platform co-exist without adding complexity to the existing hospital infrastructure.

Again, no word on what software and Android version Dell is actually shipping the Streak with, but it’s a bold and interesting new strategy none the less. Dell has a few supporting quotes at the press release here.

We’ve previously questioned Dell’s decision to deliver the Streak with an older version of Android, especially when more than 70 percent of the Android market has shifted to the 2.x code base.

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