I hope everyone is doing well! We’ve recently upgraded to the latest version of OpenEMR (7.x) in our clinic, and we’re excited about the new features and improvements. However, we’ve noticed that network performance has been a bit slower than usual when accessing patient data across workstations.
After doing some troubleshooting, we think it might be related to our ethernet switch. It’s an older model that has worked well in the past, but we’re considering whether it might need a reconfiguration or replacement to handle the demands of the new OpenEMR version.
Has anyone had experience with optimizing network performance after an upgrade? Could tweaking the ethernet switch settings help, or is there a best practice for network infrastructure we should follow with the new version?
Looking forward to hearing your thoughts and suggestions!
It is strange that you are having issues with the network. But my situation isn’t the same as yours (my first install was 7.x).
You don’t mention the OS you are running but have you thought of examining the processes opened (related to OpenEMR) by the webserver? Do you have excess files opened by the webserver running 7.x? You could use a command like lsof if you are using Linux.
If it’s a Gigabit switch, unless you can specifically determine that there’s some kind of problem with it, I’d look server side. If your OpenEMR host is local, easy enough to test by bringing in a new 5 or 8 port gigabit switch and connecting a couple of workstations to the server through the new switch. If response times go down, then you’ve isolated a hardware problem.
Otherwise, start looking at your application & database logging to see if there’s anything that stands out. Be aware though, V7 is by nature slower than previous versions on the same hardware, because there’s a lot more going on under the hood. If your software version upgrade didn’t come along with increased system resources, then you’re going to notice that everything takes a little longer as you’re navigating through the UI and performing clinical tasks.