Zoom and Hospital Services Limited (HSL) have reached an agreement which will enable healthcare providers across the UK and Ireland to deliver virtual care services for clinicians and patients.
HSL, who specialise in medical equipment and IT solutions for hospitals and medical practices, has a base in Belfast as well as Dublin and Nottingham.
The agreement with the global video communications giant Zoom is the first and only healthcare partnership across the UK and Ireland.
HSL states the partnership will enable it to expand the availability and adoption of virtual consultations through a widely known app, enabling the broadest possible range of patients and the general public to access different parts of the healthcare system.
During the ongoing pandemic, telehealth solutions for patient care has been widely adopted by healthcare providers across the UK and Ireland and this is expected to continue in some capacity post-pandemic.
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The team at HSL predicts that within a year, every hospital in Ireland will be using Zoom in some part of their operations, and the availability of Zoom through a healthcare partner removes the risks of investing in this technology in many more parts of healthcare development and delivery.
Dominic Walsh, CEO of Hospital Services Limited, commented: "The opportunity to work with Zoom to embed their services with the solutions that we have been delivering to healthcare providers across the UK and Ireland brings together the power and capacity of the world’s largest provider in this space with committed, dedicated, specialists, products and services that HSL already supplies to our customer base.
"The addition of this service to our growing portfolio of telehealth enabled practices and solutions empowers our customers to deliver integrated virtual health platforms as part of their Covid management plans and in a way that they will remain as part of the health service beyond this pandemic."
Ron Emerson, Global Healthcare Lead at Zoom Video Communications added: "We are excited by the prospect of working with Hospital Services Limited to create more uses for Zoom in healthcare in the UK and Ireland in ways that will exploit the fantastic capabilities, current and future, that Zoom provides.
"I know and have worked with the HSL Telehealth team for many years and understand the specialist skills and experience they provide that can help healthcare providers to embrace and use Zoom to deliver benefit to clinicians and patients alike."
Source: Hospital Services Limited press release