In the world of healthcare, you need to make sure that your organization has access to the medical equipment and fixed assets that it needs. The use of passive Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) asset tracking systems and software (like Grey Trunk RFID) can assist your medical facility by helping everyone to stay organized. It’s much easier to help your patients when medical employees can use a handheld RFID reader to track and maintain key assets. Within this article, we’ll be discussing both how and why Ultra-High Frequency (UHF) mobile RFID asset tracking in hospitals can be beneficial.
The Significance of RFID Technology in Healthcare
The use of passive RFID asset tracking in hospitals has evolved the way that they look at asset management. Inventory management becomes a much simpler process when RFID technology makes it take up less work and time than the manual inventory tracking counterpart. To make sure that patients stay safe, hospitals need to ensure that they don’t run out of necessary equipment or have it break when they need it the most. When RFID is used, it improves the lives of both patients and employees.
With handheld RFID readers, the process of RFID asset tracking becomes more mobile. When it’s easy to track equipment all throughout the hospital, everything from heart-rate monitors to surgery equipment can be easily found and maintained. When assets are in working condition, hospital workers can give their patients more attention and care instead of having to fret over their equipment status.
Advantages of Implementing Passive RFID Asset Tracking in Hospitals
Using passive UHF mobile RFID asset tracking has several benefits for the healthcare organizations that choose to implement it:
- Less Lost Equipment: As assets exchange between departments, mobile RFID asset tracking can keep track of where they’re at as they’re checked in or checked out.
- Schedule Maintenance with Ease: Grey Trunk RFID is an excellent option for the medical industry. It allows you to schedule maintenance and receive reports on it so that medical equipment is ready when you need it.
- Understand Your Inventory Status: The power of RFID lets you understand what your hospital has on hand. Instead of using error-prone methods like counting inventory by hand, your staff can concentrate on improving the lives of patients.
- Save Money and Improve Efficiency: With RFID, a hospital can quickly know exactly where their assets are at. This saves the workers time and lets them avoid buying or renting equipment they don’t need.
Implementing a Passive UHF Mobile RFID Asset Tracking System: A Step-by-Step Guide
Although passive RFID systems for hospitals are useful, there is a bit of a process to implementing them. By following the steps below, your hospital will be on its way to a speedy and efficient mobile tracking system.
Preliminary Steps:
- What Are Your Needs?: Figure out what assets you’ll be tracking, where they’re going to be stored in the facility and any asset management related problems your hospital might face.
- Consult with RFID Experts: Identification experts such as the ones at Metalcraft can help you to find the right product to fit your medical facility’s needs.
Implementation Steps:
- Apply RFID Tags to Your Assets: The medical assets and equipment you’ll be tracking will need passive RFID tags. Using these tags will let you store data on the assets like their locations, names and maintenance history.
- Employee Training on Handheld Readers: These devices are what are used to scan assets and update information within the Grey Trunk RFID asset tracking system. Employees will need to be trained on their proper use to ensure that the inventory status updates and maintenance reports are going smoothly.
- Setting Up Asset Tracking Rules: From maintenance to scanning assets and doing inventory assets, your hospital will want to create procedures for how these processes will be done.
- Make Changes as Needed: Hospital workers will want to analyze how the RFID system is working for them. Things can be moved around or adjusted to make the asset tracking process run like a well-oiled machine.
Real-World Examples of Improving Patient Care with Passive RFID
Passive RFID technology in healthcare environments makes the asset tracking process simple while greatly improving the lives of patients. There are some real-world examples below about how the combination of RFID tags, readers and software can change hospitals for the better.
Quickly Find Essential Equipment: Passive RFID asset tracking systems let hospitals find things like defibrillators and ventilators quickly. When you’re trying to save a life, time is of the essence. With RFID tracking, staff can quickly find life-saving items and use them on the patient. An example of this is finding a defibrillator when a patient is under cardiac arrest.
Equipment That’s Ready When You Need It: Finding equipment is important, but if biomedical equipment isn’t working, it’s not going to be effective. The combination of RFID readers with passive RFID tags lets workers properly maintain their equipment and see how often it’s checked in/out for use. By taking the initiative with equipment maintenance, it’ll reduce the risk of malfunctions with equipment like a dialysis machine.
Take Inventory Without Disturbing Patients: When you use a passive RFID system in a medical facility, the fixed assets don’t have to be right in front of the scanner (unlike with barcodes). This means that taking inventory won’t interrupt the patients while they’re trying to rest.
Scenario: Taking Routine Inventory in a Hospital Room: In this scenario, there’s a hospital with a multitude of different equipment pieces. From monitors and infusion pumps to patient beds, there are all sorts of things in patient rooms to keep track of. With a method like barcode, hospital employees have to enter every room, find the assets and then scan the barcode with a direct line of sight. This is cumbersome and it has the potential to interfere with patient care. Passive UHF RFID systems make this process faster and less intrusive.
RFID tags and handheld RFID readers allow the hospital to take inventory from a distance. This can be from the doorway to a patient’s room or even just within the hall. Being face-to-face with the tags isn’t required with RFID. The tags can be scanned from a distance. Each one has a unique code that allows you to assign inventory or status info/descriptions to the hospital’s assets.
RFID Inventorying Benefits:
- Provide a Calmer Patient Environment: When workers don’t need to physically find and scan each item, the patients will have less interruptions during their stay. RFID brings peace of mind the workers and patients alike.
- A More Efficient Process: When inventories can be taken at a faster pace, it leaves more time for staff to look after patients. RFID can make this dream a reality.
- Know Asset Locations: It’s easier to manage and maintain equipment when you know where it’s at. This lets hospitals only purchase necessary equipment while doing routine check ups and maintenance on the inventory they already have.
Passive RFID systems like Grey Trunk RFID allow hospitals to put their patients first. Through this technology, a hospital can properly manage its inventory without needing to go directly into the patient’s room. When it’s used in the healthcare industry, RFID makes for a smoother workflow. This allows for an increased devotion to serving patients.
Conclusion
Hospitals greatly benefit from the use of a passive UHF mobile RFID asset tracking system. When they can manage/track fixed assets with ease, hospitals can guarantee that they’re in the proper condition to save lives. Less time spent worrying about asset conditions lets medical workers put their patients first. As new issues arise in the medical industry, the power of passive RFID tracking systems is ready to rise up to the challenge.
Related Articles
- What are the Benefits of Healthcare Asset Tracking Software?
- Fixed Asset Tracking Software: Why Your Organization Needs It
- What is an RFID Asset Tag for Fixed Assets?
 | About the Author: Colby Weber Colby is Grey Trunk RFID’s Marketing Assistant. He enjoys being able to combine his marketing and public relations skills with his writing and graphic design abilities to assist in Grey Trunk’s marketing efforts. He has one brother, a niece, and two nephews. In his free time, Colby enjoys playing video games and trading card games. He’s also a fan of anime and creating digital artwork on his drawing tablet. |
