Hospitals turning a ‘pager’ on data hardware

Like so many in his profession, Dr. Jason A. Tracy used a pager to send and receive urgent messages every day. It was by his side for nearly 20 years, ever-present on his belt, vibrating with purposeful vigor whenever Tracy was needed by a patient or colleague.

That was until a couple months ago, when, for the first time in his medical career, Tracy took off his pager and never put it back on. He turned instead to a secure application that allowed him to text colleagues on a sleek and decidedly 21st-century device, his iPhone.