Georgetown University Hospital is participating in a study on the effectiveness and efficiency of using bar codes compared with radio frequency identification to track blood transfusions from donor to patient, InformationWeek reports.
Precision Dynamics has provided its Smart Band RFID Wristband System for the study, which acts as a portable database storing patient information that can be updated throughout the patient's stay at the hospital (Sullivan, InformationWeek, 3/11). The wristband's RFID chip contains patient information such as name, blood type, allergies and medications, and it can be read through the body, clothing, bed coverings and non-metallic materials.
Nurses use a scanner attached to a personal digital assistant to read the chip, which displays the data on the screen and allows nurses to check the transfusion order and the actual blood product to be administered (Health Data Management, 3/11).
Georgetown previously used bar code tags to check blood transfusions (InformationWeek, 3/11). The hospital will compare the experiences of nurses using the two systems to decide whether RFID should replace bar codes in some or all applications, Health Data Management reports (Health Data Management, 3/11).
The first phase of the study began on March 1, and it is unclear how long this stage will last. The research phase and clinical implementation will begin two or three weeks after the first phase is completed (InformationWeek, 3/11).
Georgetown also will implement a transfusion software system from AMTSystems that supports RFID (Health Data Management, 3/11).