Case Study: Oaknoll Retirement Community achieves secure, high-performance Wi‑Fi and improved care mobility with Fortinet

Retirement Community provides secure high-performance Wi-Fi with ubiquitous wireless coverage

Oaknoll Retirement Residence, a 10‑acre continuing care community in Iowa City serving about 300 residents across independent living, assisted living and a 48‑bed health center, was hampered by an aging 802.11 a/b/g Wi‑Fi network. Steel, concrete and fire‑retardant drywall created dead zones and poor throughput, leaving the network unable to support residents’ streaming/Skype use or mission‑critical applications like VoIP Nurse Call and HIPAA‑compliant access to Cerner.

Oaknoll deployed a Fortinet solution—FortiGate plus 120 FortiAP 802.11ac access points with high‑density placement and integrated malware/web‑filtering—delivering campus‑wide coverage and unified security management. The upgrade eradicated coverage holes, dramatically improved Internet performance, enabled reliable VoWLAN and Nurse Call systems that increased staff mobility and responsiveness, and simplified administration through a single console.

Oaknoll Retirement Community

Steve Cuppy

CIO