Hospitals deal with a large number of patients on a daily basis, which involves the movement of an even greater amount of supplies and equipment. Today's healthcare facilities are under serious pressure to have equipment available at the right time and location. Combining nursery tasks with tracing hospital equipment is an inefficient use of resources when alternatives are available.
Fujitsu Components has developed an IoT solution to cover hospital asset management; the solution can also monitor environmental conditions, such as room temperature, acceleration and humidity.
Fujitsu has developed a solution that can trace any hospital asset equipped with Fujitsu tags. It is based upon mesh networking, which allows communication between all assets. This way, anchor nodes build a network that allows the asset tags to communicate data to the gateway. By using the mesh network, an unlimited amount of assets can be added or removed without the need for network maintenance; the assets tags simply reroute the data.
The solution offers operators a live view of where assets are located and how many are available - even maintenance information can be added. In real life, this enables the maintenance department, nurses and any member of staff to locate assets such as hospital beds, and monitor their occupation and maintenance. But the solution is not limited to just hospital beds; all types of hospital equipment can have Fujitsu tags, from various medical devices and wheelchairs, to life-saving equipment like a defibrillator. Plus the possibilities are not restricted to only tracking assets; the solution can also be applied to avoid picking errors in hospital warehousing or in patient medication distribution.
In hospitals, monitoring environmental data can be of great importance for the patient and for a medical device's life cycle. Fujitsu Sensor Beacons can be used to monitor various environmental values, like temperature, humidity or acceleration, providing a wealth of information that can contribute to patient well-being and provide insight on variables that can influence device maintenance and stock control of medical devices.
Whether used to monitor visitor experience or patient-traffic flow, indoor navigation provides multiple advantages. App-based indoor navigation can offer the visitor tailored information about appointments, waiting times and routes, therefore contributing towards a positive hospital experience. Indoor navigation also allows insight into visitor and patient traffic and enables detailed profiling of visitor behaviour.
Fujitsu Smart Beacon is a Bluetooth smart transmitter that broadcasts specific data in the form of a unique identification number, information on transmission power or a URL. The unique identification number enables smart devices - such as a phone or tablet - to recognise the beacon and relate it to a specific app. The number also identifies the group or groups to which that specific beacon belongs. Information about the transmission power can be used for navigation and localisation purposes. Combining information provided on transmission power and information retrieved from the unique identification number enables precise navigation and localisation - right down to specific rooms and areas. Indoor navigation requires a predictable transmitting characteristic, and the Fujitsu beacons are able to do this consistently. Beacons are also able to broadcast a URL that will be displayed on smart devices and can be activated by the user. This provides web-based interaction with the user that can then involve any type of information.
The Fujitsu IoT Connectivity Solutions offer great advantages for nursing and maintenance staff, as well for management. The solution provides insight on usage, efficiency and maintenance, which offers great potential for process optimisation.
