The popularity of VoIP communication systems among healthcare systems is on the rise, with the mobility offered by such a system to the hospital staff being a major advantage in a hospital setting. The increase in communication and collaboration that is made possible by VoIP calling helps to reduce costs while also increasing employee productivity and the quality of patient care.
The key advantage of VoIP calling in a hospital is the communication-on-the-go that is achieved through such a phone system. This is especially significant for medical personnel, for which it is not practical to remain seated at a single desk all day long. Traditional phone systems end up being no better than voice message box, with two-way communication being a rarity using them.

In addition to encouraging mobile communication, a VoIP phone system is also being used to streamline communication in the healthcare environment in several hospitals in Austin, by integrating data, voice, and video requirements in a single infrastructure. By employing such a system, the entire patient records in the hospital can be digitalized, making retrieval of this data a lot easier and quicker.
Patients can also benefit from the feature of videoconferencing, which makes instant specialist consultations possible, encouraging collaborative treatment approaches. The use of advanced healthcare IT applications like Electronic Medical Records (EMR), Positive Patient Identification (PPID), Picture Archiving And Communication Systems (PACS), Computerized Practitioner Order Entry (CPOE), etc. have a significant positive impact on the quality of care offered.
VoIP can also help in cost-cutting, through technological convergence, as well as cheap long-distance communication and video conferencing. In addition to wireless IP phones, VoIP telephone systems are also being used for a variety of other voice and data systems in Austin hospitals. These include- wearable badges, IP phones for nursing stations, teleconferencing phones, etc. These phone systems also make it possible to communicate in different languages through in-build translation features, which is a valuable benefit in hospitals catering to diverse communities.
Such a system is also a lot easier to manage and protect as compared to a conventional telephone system. The I.T. staff can manage the phone system through a centralized network, which reduces the complexity of the system significantly, making it possible to deploy the I.T. staff to more advanced projects. With the total payback period for a VoIP phone system in a healthcare organization averaging around 18-24 months, this is being viewed as a worthwhile investment by most hospitals.