I was recently talking with an associate of mine who works in the security industry (video/card access solutions). He shared with me the following scenario where they are leveraging their technology to save on PPE use, limit the exposure to health care providers and safeguard much needed equipment that has seen a rise in theft since this COVID19 pandemic started. The following outlines their solutions that have been implemented at New York hospitals and beyond:

  • Situation one:
    • Hospital rooms have call buttons for patients to get attention but no intercom capabilities.  In normal time, a member of the medical staff would come to see what is happening.
    • With the current pandemic, each time a staff enters a patient’s room with Covid19, they need to remove and throw away their PPE upon exiting the room.
    • The proposed solution is to create a rapid intercom system on a rolling cart with video using Sipelia and Axis camera which support VoIP.  The microphone on the camera does not require the patient to do anything.
      • Using the public address functionality of Sipelia could also be used in temporary hospitals to call doctors or make public announcement while having the video.
    • The intercom solution is being deployed in NYC hospitals.  It has a lot of merit in terms of saving scarce PPE equipment plus time for the medical staff on hand. 
  • Situation two:
    • This is a more sensitive issue as it focuses on the PPE equipment going missing.  The idea is to put a temporary ACS system in place to monitor the cabinets or room where PPE equipment is stored and provide a way for hospitals to run checks on people taking supplies.  This can be tied in with video. There is a dissuasive element to the solution where people with access will understand that it is being monitored as medicines. 

The following are the technical details for the Intercom as well as the list of supported cameras (These are AXIS cameras, but I believe other video products could also support this model):

  • AXIS P3245-V Network Camera
  • AXIS P3245-VE Network Camera
  • AXIS P3227-LV Network Camera
  • AXIS P3227-LVE Network Camera
  • AXIS P3228-LV Network Camera
  • AXIS P3228-LVE Network Camera
  • AXIS Q3515-LV Network Camera – 9mm
  • AXIS Q3515-LVE Network Camera – 9mm
  • AXIS Q3515-LV Network Camera – 22mm
  • AXIS Q3515-LVE Network Camera – 22mm
  • AXIS Q3517 Network Camera
  • AXIS Q3518-LVE Network Camera
  • AXIS M3057-PLVE Network Camera
  • AXIS M3058-PLVE Network Camera
  • AXIS Q9216-SLV Network Camera
  • AXIS M3115-LVE Network Camera
  • AXIS M3116-LVE Network Camera
  • AXIS M3205-LVE Network Camera
  • AXIS M3206-LVE Network Camera
  • AXIS M3064-V Network Camera
  • AXIS M3065-V Network Camera
  • AXIS M3066-V Network Camera
  • AXIS M3075-V Network Camera

Please feel free to reach out to me with any questions but thought this was good information to share!