PoINT Storage Manager in Use at Diakonie in Südwestfalen

Diakonie in Südwestfalen gGmbH counters rising hardware costs in the field of archive storage by introducing automated archiving on tape with PoINT Storage Manager. Thus, it also benefits from ifunctions for legally compliant archiving of medical documents.

It stores, among others, important medical data from surgical robots, from X-ray PACS and mammography screening. For diagnostic purposes, this data must be available reliably and quickly. At the same time, it must be archived in a legally compliant manner for the long term.

With the redundant storage of data on HDDs, it was possible to ensure the availability of the data. However, there were no more extensive functions for long-term archiving of the data. In addition, the lifespan of the storage medium used was relatively short in view of the long retention periods. This required frequent, high-volume migrations with the associated costs for new storage hardware.

In PoINT Storage Manager, Diakonie in Südwestfalen found a flexible and scalable solution for legally compliant data archiving. With the introduction of the software, the storage infrastructure could be sustainably optimized. The Diakonie now uses a 2-tier storage architecture with primary and archive storage tiers. On the archive storage level, tape is used which, as a cost-effective and durable storage medium, is for long-term archiving. PoINT Storage Manager automatically moves the data to the archive storage. There, the software with its integrated features ensures legally compliant archiving and meets the retention periods.

“In addition to expanding from one archive (PACS) to four archives, we were able to decouple applications and archiving. We now have more functions available for archiving”, says Hans-Georg Ommer, head of technical IT at Diakonie in Südwestfalen. End users can still access the data quickly and transparently – this is essential, especially for medical diagnostics. Ommer expresses his confidence with regard to growing data volumes: “For future extensions we remain flexible in all directions with PoINT Storage Manager.”