1,721,009 research outputs found
Clinical Engineering (from devices to systems)
No full textCovers the critical issues relating to the risk management and design of new technologies in the healthcare sector, including a comprehensive summary of the advances in clinical engineering over the past 40 years, presenting guidance on compliance and safety for hospitals and engineering teams.
This contributed book contains chapters from international experts, who provide their solutions, experiences, and the successful methodologies they have applied to solve common problems in the area of healthcare technology. Topics include compliance with the European Directive on Medical Devices 93/42/EEC, European Norms EN 60601-1-6, EN 62366, and the American Standards ANSI/AAMI HE75: 2009.
Content coverage includes decision support systems, clinical complex systems, and human factor engineering. Examples are fully supported with case studies, and global perspective is maintained throughout. This book is ideal for clinical engineers, biomedical engineers, hospital administrators and medical technology manufacturers
Custom active RFID solution for children tracking and identifying in a resuscitation ward
No full textIn this work is discussed an active RFId system to track and identify patients in a children's critical care ward. The technical solutions may be very different according to the patients type, age and cognitive conditions and according to the hospital shapes. The proposed system to track and identify patients has been developed taking into account all the constraints induced by the particular environment. The system is composed of five different hardware devices and a tracking software, purposely designed and realized
The role of bioengineer in hospital upkeep and development
No full textIn Italy, hospitals of different dimensions have been equipped, in the last years, with a clinical engineering structure that is leaded by a bioengineer whose main role is management of bioinstrumentation in terms of planning for purchases and maintenance. Nevertheless, if we think that hospital structures, particularly those with considerable dimensions, are subject to a nearly continuous upkeep process, we can locate a new crucial role for bioengineers: being the main referents of upkeep process together with hospital’s CEO. The process of upkeep and development of a hospital is always a complex multi-project that involves many steps starting from a deep planning effort. In this process, we maintain, the bioengineer should be involved starting from scratch
A decision support system for technological planning and management of field hospitals
No full textA well-planned medical response should consider the use of field hospitals 'FHs' specialised for the disasters and planned to guarantee high technical and medical standards. The purpose of this work is to support in locating technical requirements for FHs planning through an analysis of the most important and useful variables for the installation. A review of disaster medicine literature and technical norms has been carried out in order to offer support in individualising functional and technical requirements for FH planning through an analysis of the most important and useful variables for the installation. Three FH types were designed to be used in emergency and disaster medicine according to the kind of event, to the disaster area and to the local health care system capacity. Organisational, technical and technological requirements for each FH area were provided in order to improve hygiene and quality criteria for a safe and efficient system
SEMIO: An expert system for monitoring critical hospital infrastructures
No full textThe expert system for tracking critical hospital infrastructures is able to simulate the effects cascade induced in a system of infrastructure when there are interdependencies between the different plants. This article outlines a method to obtain the connection between the facilities of a hospital - based on Input-Output Inoperability Model - and a web based software for the application of the method to the hospital, simulating a possible scenario of concurrent faults
RFId-based tracking and safety system
No full textIn our country and in the international context, there is a continuous interest in the issue of safety and quality of health care. In scientific literature you can find out that the problem of incorrect identification of patients is often due to errors and omissions in the processes of diagnosis and treatment, such as those found in the administration of drugs or in providing treatment. In healthcare risk of error in identification of the patient can be amplified by critical conditions as the treatment of emergency cases, the involvement of more stakeholders in the management of the case and obviously the specific clinical condition of the patient, such as loss of consciousness or confusion. The department identified in the analysis and study of the pilot project was a Department of Intensive Care. The choice of this department comes from the need to increase the security level of the process of identification of patients and to avoid possible trade. The overall goal of this project is to provide a system of aid for the reduction of cases of incorrect identification of the patient and for monitoring the position of the patient within the hospital. Finally we tested benefits and we provided for the residual error of the new process of identification and traceability after the introduction of RFID systems
Medical software management: A failure analysis approach for maintenance and safety plan
No full textMedical software management represents one of
the biggest future challenge in healthcare. Technology level is
actually waiting for appropriate normative and regulatory support
by including maintenance, assistance and safety.
This paper aims to highlight the critical aspects in medical
software management and specifically to provide a methodology
in order to support decision makers responsible for medical
software assistance in health structures. The results show how
medical software effectiveness depends on technical, organizational
and clinical aspects
Health Technology Management. A Database Analysis as Support of Technology Managers in Hospitals
No full textTechnology management in healthcare must continually respond and adapt itself to new improvements in medical equipment. Multidisciplinary approaches which consider the interaction of different technologies, their use and user skills, are necessary in order to improve safety and quality. An easy and sustainable methodology is vital to Clinical Engineering (CE) services in healthcare organizations in order to define criteria regarding technology acquisition and replacement. This article underlines the critical aspects of technology management in hospitals by providing appropriate indicators for benchmarking CE services exclusively referring to the maintenance database from the CE department at the Careggi Hospital in Florence, Italy. © 2011 - IOS Press and the authors. All rights reserved
Longitudinal expandable shelter for medical response during disasters
No full textINTRODUCTION: During medical emergencies, hospitals represent the final point of the whole rescue process. Therefore, effective health mobile structures have to be inserted between hospitals and the place of the event with the aim of giving the best of cures (using appropriate and easy to use equipment) for a safer and faster evacuation to hospitals. METHODS: Literature review and national and international disaster medicine standards were the basis for this study to provide clinical, hygienical, and organizational needs to satisfy for the medical structure design. Project requirements have been obtained by analyzing structural, organizational, and clinical process necessities. Structural requirements respond to the possibility of installation on every ground type, resistance to every weather condition, and necessity of easy and fast transportation. Technological equipment is obtained from clinical evaluation for patient stabilization. RESULTS: The designed structure results to be a longitudinal expandable shelter (LES) for medical emergencies response organized in three internal functional areas. Possibility of automatic expandability allows rapid transportation and easy deployment. The functional internal organization provides three areas: "Diagnostic," "Therapeutic," and "Pre-evacuation monitoring." Further, longitudinal expandability supports the basic hygienical rules in healthcare processes allowing the unidirectional flow of casualties from dirtier to cleaner areas of the structure. CONCLUSIONS: LES represents the answer to expressed requisites by disaster medicine standards and guidelines. It aims to provide an efficient and effective support for sanitary aid in response to disasters or emergencies, by improving aspects related to effectiveness, hygiene, and quality of clinical performances especially for highest critical cases
Risk Management Process and CE Marking of Software as MD
No full textComputers and software are more and more used for the scope of the clinical data analysis and for the patient treatment control. At the same time a lot of electrical medical device are used together for increase their function and to expand their performance, in a logic of a system thought as a single unit. This integration may bring new hazards, created by functional supplementary connections and by those linked to software. An appropriate design approach, including a deep and integrated risk analysis, must then be performed. A wide legislative and technical standard context has to be considered to achieve a CE marked (i.e. "ready-for-the-market") product. In this study main international technical standard related both to software and to MD are taken into account to define a sort of guideline to software related CE marking. © 2010 International Federation for Medical and Biological Engineering
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