Case Study: Mount Desert Island Hospital achieves resilient 24x7 network reliability and improved patient care with Fortinet Security Fabric

Network Reliability Enhances Patient Health How Fortinet Secures a Critical Access Hospital

Mount Desert Island Hospital, a critical-access provider serving a cluster of islands off Maine, faced unique reliability and security challenges: dramatic seasonal patient surges, single points of failure for connectivity, aging firewall hardware, and a shift in cyber threats from ransomware toward disruptive attacks that could jeopardize patient care. As the only nearby acute-care facility, the hospital needed 24/7 resilient network and coordinated security to avoid potentially life‑threatening service interruptions.

The hospital deployed the Fortinet Security Fabric—FortiGate NGFWs, Secure SD‑WAN, FortiExtender cellular backups (with AT&T FirstNet and Verizon LTE/5G), FortiAP, FortiAuthenticator, FortiNAC, FortiSwitch, FortiVoice and supporting management/analytics and deception tools—which centralized visibility and automated response across the estate. The results: faster, networkwide policy updates and threat blocking (FortiDeceptor identified 500+ IPs), rock‑solid phone uptime (about five minutes total downtime during cutover), reduced staff time on troubleshooting, lower vendor dependence, and improved overall reliability for patient care.

Mount Desert Island Hospital

Tom Mockus

Director of IT