The sessions have enabled direct communication with 1,500 health workers. CENETEC estimates another 1,500 have accessed recordings of the sessions via retransmission over the video communication network or as streaming content over the Web. Mexico's health experts also anticipate the video communication network will prove invaluable this fall as the traditional winter flu season takes hold and more outbreaks may occur.

In Mexico, health officials regularly leverage the video conferencing network for a range of telemedicine and tele-education uses. For instance, to bring expert care to residents of Mexico's impoverished Oaxaca state, CENETEC uses 15 mobile Polycom units that travel from location to location. The systems are set up in a location esplanade -- typically a town dwelling -- and health care workers see patients for four to five days. In a typical month, medical personnel will treat 200 patients. The field teams use a 512Kbps satellite link (384 Kbps is used for videoconferencing) to consult with experts in the cities of Mexico and Oaxaca.

"We've had outstanding performance from these Polycom solutions and with the installation and support services from Grupo SIO," said Pacheco, who credits Polycom's standard-based architecture for CENETEC's ability to video conference with a wide range of systems. "Each session performed without any interruptions or disconnections, even though we conducted them over the Internet and were interacting with legacy systems and other vendors' equipment."

"CENETEC's video conferencing network needs to be reliable and provide high quality, which is why we recommended the Polycom systems," said Jorge Peraf n, General Director, Grupo SIO. "The organization needs to be able to connect with other agencies and organizations in situations like the H1N1 crisis, and the Polycom systems allow them to easily connect with other standards-based systems regardless of manufacturer. The systems also provide a reliable call experience, even over the public Internet, which adds to the overall network reliability and ultimately to greater customer satisfaction."

SOURCE: Polycom, Inc.