Security & Safety Things highlight ways in which healthcare operations can enhance patient safety with smart cameras

In the past year, hospitals, eldercare and other healthcare facilities have found themselves overwhelmed with new patients, COVID-19 regulations and other side effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.

As efforts focused on the mitigation of pandemic health risks for patients and staff, routine and elective procedures were halted, only to seesaw back and forth, as conditions shifted around the globe. Now, decision makers for healthcare facilities find themselves in search of solutions to help navigate the new healthcare landscape and protect bottom lines.

Importance of AI in R&D methods

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been a critical tool in revolutionising critical disease treatments, as well as research and development methods, but it now is also transforming healthcare operations. Security & Safety Things (S&ST) offers a platform for smart cameras that enables the cameras to run a variety of different applications, in order to perform different functions, much like a smartphone.

When equipped with AI-enabled video analytics, these cameras are helping healthcare facility operators more efficiently manage day-to-day operations, automate staff intensive processes, and provide the ability to achieve more efficient, cost-effective operations for a more robust bottom line.

Privacy masking for patient anonymity

Privacy masking is particularly vital in eldercare facilities and memory care units

Compliance with patient privacy regulations, such as HIPAA and GDPR guidelines, is of top priority for many medical facilities. Smart video analytics can deploy privacy mask applications to hide a customisable set of objects within the camera’s field of view, such as faces or equipment, including medical monitors, laptops or keyboards, devices where sensitive health data is often displayed.

Privacy masking is particularly vital in eldercare facilities and memory care units, where enhanced monitoring of elderly and dementia patients is crucial to their safety, without violating privacy.

Enhanced patient safety and fall detection

The ability to detect spills and foreign objects in hallways and other highly trafficked areas contributes greatly to decreasing risk of patient harm from slips/falls. Smart cameras reduce these occurrences by detecting spills or other hazards at the time of occurrence, enabling immediate action from staff.

Simultaneously, applications can be utilised for fall detection and allow IoT cameras to monitor and analyse patient, visitor and staff behaviour, in order to determine whether a person stands upright, lies on the floor, or remains seated. These analytics allow staff to be alerted in case of unusual behaviour, making every walk from bed to toilet much safer, particularly for elderly and disabled patients.

Smart cameras with LPR technology

A major pain point in many medical facilities is quick access to emergency departments and overall chokepoints in patient admittance. When connected to patient admission and registration systems, smart cameras equipped with vehicle licence plate recognition apps can automatically log arrival times, licence plate numbers and patients, increasing operational speed and quality of patient admittance.

For large hospitals and busy emergency access points, smart cameras can detect obstructions in driveways, which if left unattended could cost approaching ambulances critical seconds. These same cameras offer hospital staff insights into how they can improve patient intake, by detecting issues with the vehicle and human traffic flow.