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CASESTUDYLASER SPINE INSTITUTEBusiness Transformation Performance latenciesClinicians were experiencingnegatively impacteddelays in accessing files forclinician productivity.Locationpatients. The new solution givesNorth Americathem access to records and imageschallenges of forced datawithout delay, freeing them tomigration and forklift upgrades. The company faced theIndustryspend more quality time withHealthcarepatients. At the same time, the ITIT Transformationstaff spends dramatically less time Time to open a patient recordCompanyon storage management, so theyLaser Spine Institutecan pursue innovative projects thatbenefit the entire organization.Use Case Database Electronic MedicalRecords (EMR) VDI VSIChallenges Legacy storage lacked theslashed by up to 95 percent. All patient records, includingX-rays and MRIs, delivered onhigh-performance flash storage. Effortless storage managementfrees IT staff to focus onperformance to supportinnovative ways to improve thevirtualized applications.patient experience. Aging storage infrastructurewas overly complex and hardto manage.

Offering Exceptional Patient CareLaser Spine Institute is the leaderThe Solution: FlashStackin minimally invasive spineAt the Laser Spine Institute, theresurgery, having helped more thanIn cooperation with its systemis a single goal: to provide patients60,000 patients through sevenintegration partner, Presidio, thewith relief from their chronicsurgery centers across thecompany’s IT team looked atneck and back pain. To supportUnited States.offerings from several storagethat commitment, the company’svendors and eventually narrowedIT organization takes the sameIn addition to the mantra ofthe list to two companies for aattitude. “Our role is to deliver aimproving patients’ lives, a guidingproof-of-concept test.high level of service to our staff,principle for the organizationso they can deliver an even higheris simplification for operational“We wanted to test a cross-level of service to our patients,”efficiency. Thus, when thesection of our entire environmentsaid Chris Yinger, Senior Directorcompany’s spinning-disk storageduring the POC, so we evaluatedof IT at the institute’s headquarterssystem hit the end of its lifecyclea subset of database servers,in Tampa, Florida.after seven years, simplificationvirtualized applications, and MRIwas a key requirement in findingand X-ray images, to see howa replacement.the storage array worked and“It takes genius totake a complexsolution and make itsimple. The Cisco andPure Storage solutionis pure genius.”what the impact on users was“Our legacy system was innovativewhen we pushed it to its limits,”at the time it was purchased, withYinger said.features like tiering, but as theorganization grew, it became aThe performance of themanagement nightmare,” Yingercombination of Cisco UCS said. “Our team was focusedservers and the Pure Storage arraymore on managing IOPS thanin the FlashStack configurationactually delivering value to thedelivered the best outcome.organization. To provision virtual2Chris Yingerdesktops, we always had to pin“Hands-down everyone loved theSenior Director of ITthem to solid-state drives toresults; they wanted more of it.make sure they weren’t tieringWhen we took it away from them atdown to lower levels. It was anthe end of the POC, many peopleunsustainable situation, given allasked how they could get it back.the other data we had in motion.”We’re talking about a breadth ofCASESTUDY LASER SPINE INSTITUTE

end-users, including clinicians,the Pure Storage array. It was a100TB raw on the legacy system tophysicians, back-office personnelseamless, transparent operation,an effective 271TB on Pure Storageand IT staff.”with zero impact on end-users.—has allowed the organizationThe only thing they experiencedto store its MRI and X-ray imagesAfter the organization decided towas the huge performanceon the new system. “Even thoughmove forward with the FlashStackgain once the transitionimages don’t compress well, weconverged infrastructure fromwas completed.”still felt it was the right thing to doCisco and Pure Storage, there wasfor our patients to put them ona rapid transition from the legacyTwo FlashStack configurations,flash,” Yinger said. “By offeringstorage system.each with a FlashArray//M50, werehigh-performance, high-availabilitypurchased, to serve the main dataaccess to these images, our“The hardest part of installing thecenter in Tampa and a disaster-physicians and staff can stayPure Storage array as part of therecovery site.focused on patient needs, ratherFlashStack configurationthan spend time waiting for anwas unboxing it,” Yinger said.The new FlashStack convergedimage to load. With flash, even an“It took less than two weeksinfrastructure hosts the institute’sarchived image from six or sevento migrate 100TB of data ontoentire production workload,years ago can be availableincluding its NextGen almost instantaneously.”“Hands-down everyoneloved the results;they wanted moreof it.”Chris YingerSenior Director of ITAmbulatory EHR, an electronichealth record application,The impact of the newsupporting Microsoft SQL Server,infrastructure has been feltOracle , and Oracle MySQLthroughout the organization.databases. The facility is using acombination of Citrix XenDesktop“The reaction we’ve had fromand XenApp to deliver bothend-users has been extremelyvirtualized applications and virtualpositive,” Yinger noted. “In our olddesktops to 1000 employeesenvironment, it would sometimesthroughout the organization.take several minutes to open upa patient record. Now, it takes a3The increased capacity deliveredmatter of seconds. As patientsby the Pure Storage array—frommove throughout our networkCASESTUDY LASER SPINE INSTITUTE

to receive care, the related“With our old storage solution, we“The beautiful thing is that weimages, medical histories and vitalcouldn’t easily spin up additionalno longer are in the business ofphysician notes are always on handvirtual machines or desktops,”managing IOPS,” Yinger said.and available to authorized users.”Yinger added. “Now that we have“We just give our users accessthe FlashStack solution, everyoneto VDI and to the resources theyHe adds that they used to haveis running to get a virtual desktopneed. I can’t overemphasize theapplications that would reachprovisioned, not only because it’sease of management withinto the hundreds of millisecondsso much faster than their desktop,Pure Storage.”of latency, and that had a verybut because it’s also portable.”negative impact on staffand patients.Yinger is impressed by theFlashStack Solutionapproach Pure Storage takesSimplifies Managementwith its product development and“After we put the Cisco andinnovative business model.Pure Storage solution in place,In addition to the positive impactwe have seen consistentlyon clinicians and patients, the“A Pure array is purpose-built forsub-millisecond latencies.FlashStack implementation hasflash technology,” he noted, “andIt’s phenomenal.”brought numerous benefits to thecomes equipped with advancedIT department.features without extra charge.A few weeks after productionapplications were moved ontothe FlashStack configuration, aconsultant compared latencieson typical workloads betweenthe new and old storage systems.Average read latency went from3.24 ms to 0.42 ms, a drop of87 percent, with maximum latencyplunging 91 percent, from16 ms to 1.47 ms.Average write latency droppedfrom 4.24 ms to 0.63 ms, withmaximum write latency slashed by96 percent, from 25 ms to 1.05 ms.4CASESTUDY LASER SPINE INSTITUTE

And the Pure Evergreen Storagedon’t have to manageif we remove our X-ray and MRImodel—with its stable long-termdisparate solutions.”images from those calculations.”flexible growth path—is such aAn early example of theThe huge boost in capacitysmart way to do business, becausecontribution Pure Storage hasdelivered by the Pure Storage arrayit gives us a stable, long-termmade to organizational efficiency“will allow us to accommodateunderstanding of costs, as well ascame during the two-month proof-the growth in patient data wella way to add capacity only whenof concept. “At the time we wereinto the future—without worryingit’s needed.”testing the Pure Storage array, Iabout where we will store it, orcosts, controller upgrades, andhad some staff turnover,” Yingerresorting to techniques like tiering,”Yinger reflected on the complexityrecalled. “I was able to get newsaid Yinger. “We have a lot ofof traditional storage systems andengineers trained and up-and-innovation going on here, and withthe business model that deliveredrunning on the Pure StoragePure Storage, it’s no longer anthem. “Smart people can takeenvironment in just half a day.issue whether we have the storagethe complex and make it morePure Storage delivers a simplifiedcapacity or performance to supportcomplex,” he observed. “It takessolution that anyone can manage.”that innovation. It’s just nevergenius to take a complexraised as an issue.”solution and make it simple.Among the standard features ofThe Cisco and Pure StoragePure Storage arrays used by theFlashStack Lowerssolution is pure genius.”institute are encryption at rest,Operating Costsespecially important for securing5The FlashStack converged-patient data; snapshots, for helpingThe efficiency of the FlashStackinfrastructure approach is perfectlyto ensure easy backup of criticalsolution also has a major impact onin sync with the institute’s mantradata with no impact on eitheroperating costs, Yinger reported.of simplification for operationalstorage capacity or end-user“We took 72U for our legacyefficiency. “It has allowed us toexperience; and data compressionstorage and consolidated it to 6U,simplify the end-points that weand deduplication. “We are seeinga 92 percent improvement for themanage,” Yinger noted. “As a2.8:1 data reduction across ourCisco and Pure Storage solution.result, my team can focus onentire storage environment,”more value-added projects forYinger reported, “and we expectPower and cooling costs havethe organization because theythat to increase further to 5:1 to 7:1declined 40 percent and willCASESTUDY LASER SPINE INSTITUTE