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Building up the benefits of RFID scanning

Peter Owens, medical engineering manager at Heart of England NHS FT, explains why his organisation decided to implement RFiD tracking and the benefits it has delivered so far.

For a number of years there was a growing concern around the number of reusable medical devices which could not be located for planned maintenance at Heart of England NHS FT. The non-availability of this equipment presented both operational and financial risks, so understanding and solving the problem was considered a priority. There has been Medical Equipment Library (MEL) facilities in the trust for over a decade but retrieving loaned devices was often challenging, leaving staff with less time to carry out other duties. 

Real-time RFiD tracking of devices had been considered previously but had never been implemented due to the large physical size of active tags, the requirement for comprehensive wi-fi coverage across the trust and the considerable set up cost. 

Starting small 

In 2012, we looked at the RFiD Discovery system from Harland Simon and found that it would overcome some of the issues which had concerned us previously. Although not a true “real-time” system, we realised that we could start small with fixed tag readers in the medical engineering workshops and equipment libraries, while the rest of the hospital could be covered using handheld scanners operated by the MEL staff when they were out collecting devices. This approach meant that we were not adding traffic to the already busy trust network and we weren’t constrained by wi-fi coverage. Another benefit for us was that a link had been developed between RFiD Discovery and our maintenance and loan database, ‘e-Quip’. This meant that we had the option to manage equipment loans automatically and record loans which might previously have been missed. 

We obtained funding to implement the system in 2013 and were able to add to it in 2014 when we added fixed readers in some wards, operating theatres and emergency departments. The implementation was further boosted in 2015 when the estates department began using the system to track beds, hoists and trolleys. As a result, more fixed readers were installed as well as more scanning with hand-held devices. The estates ‘Planet’ database has also been successfully linked to RFiD Discovery which helps them locate beds and hoists for maintenance, reducing time previously spent searching. 

The main benefits that we have seen from the system so far are that we are better able to find equipment that is due for maintenance, manage equipment loans more effectively, and retrieving devices sooner when they are no longer required. We see more equipment travelling between our hospital sites than we expected, and the tracking system allows us to spot these devices quickly when previously they might have been missed altogether.

Over 3,000 pieces of medical equipment tagged 

We don’t currently have coverage of all wards with fixed readers, and still rely heavily on scanning with handheld devices. We have tagged almost 3,000 pieces of medical equipment and almost 1,000 beds, hoists and trolleys. Additional fixed readers have been purchased and it is planned to have these installed by April 2017. 

Since the introduction of the system, we are now concerned that a proportion of the devices we can’t find may have been stolen. We have no concrete evidence that this is the case, but NHS Protect is advising that this is an increasing problem across the NHS. With this in mind, we are currently looking at the possibility of linking the RFiD Discovery system to our CCTV system with fixed readers located at exit points. The intention is that when the reader detects a tag it stores video footage of the exit. If the tag is picked up again by the system within the following 24 hours the event is disregarded, but if not the event is flagged up to security and further investigation will take place.

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