LONDON, March 17, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Cable&Wireless Worldwide has recently established the GCSX - N3 Interconnect Service. Providing a secure gateway between the Government Connect Secure Extranet (GCSX) and NHS N3 network, the service enables local councils and NHS Trusts to securely and conveniently access each others' data resources without the need to obtain and maintain additional network infrastructure.

The GCSX - N3 Interconnect Service provides the foundation for more integrated Health and Social Care by enabling secure, reliable and efficient information sharing between Local Government and the NHS.

Developed and provided by C&W Worldwide, the N3 Interconnect Service costs local authorities considerably less to obtain and run than a separate N3 connection and removes the need to duplicate the procurement and management of additional infrastructure. As a result, the Interconnect Service is not only resilient, robust and reliable but also cost effective.

Rochdale Metropolitan Borough Council has implemented the new service as an early adopter because it had been looking at ways to reduce duplicated infrastructure for some time.

Simon Watton, IS Programme Manager at Rochdale Metropolitan Borough Council, comments; "The GCSX - N3 Interconnect Service makes commercial and business sense. Our priorities are speed of implementation, high resilience, expandability and predicted lower cost of ownership, all of which were met with this implementation. It also helps us realise further cost savings as we do not have to obtain and maintain two separate connections and is much simpler as we have a single point of contact for both services."

Brian Woodford, Managing Director of Public Sector and Partners at C&W Worldwide, comments; "Fifty-six local authorities have already expressed interest in signing up to use the N3 Interconnect and we are well on our way to helping increase the number of cross Government applications that a Local Authority can securely access via their GCSX connection. This will ensure increased sharing of information and greater collaboration which will in turn create a more efficient and joined up service to the public, and at a lower cost."

Patrick Clark, Head of Government Connect, comments; "The ability for local authority staff to securely and conveniently access NHS data from their desktops, using existing infrastructure and processes, is an exciting development and a major boost to the drive towards more integrated Health and Social Care Service provision. I would encourage local authorities and NHS organisations to seek to adopt the Interconnect Service at the earliest opportunity in order to enable the shared services required to meet the increasing demand for them to be more cost efficient and join up services. There is potential for the N3 Interconnect Service to be utilised by Central as well as Local Government and I am hopeful that it will increasingly become the principal way for Government to communicate securely and effectively with the NHS."

NOTES TO EDITORS

The benefits of the GCSX - N3 Interconnect Service include:

- Cost - The new service is delivered over the existing GCSX infrastructure and costs less than an equivalent dedicated N3 line. Local authorities will only need to manage their existing GCSX connection and will not need to procure, install and manage an additional NHS connection.

- Security - Providing the N3 service in this way means the Accreditation is more manageable, reduces risk, and utilises an Accredited GCSX connection already in place.

- Speed of set-up - the new service operates across existing secure government infrastructure. As a result the service can be adopted quickly without the need to install new infrastructure.

- Operational Support - The C&W Worldwide secure hosting team has extensive experience in managing and monitoring services within this environment.

For more information please visit http://www.buyingsolutions.gov.uk or http://www.gsi.gov.uk.