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Two Welsh hospitals have installed wireless technology to allow clinical staff to access patients’ records while at their bedsides.
Clinicians at the Princess of Wales Hospital and Neath Port Talbot Hospital are working with a new Cisco wireless local area network (LAN) connection.
With wireless carts equipped with PCs and laptops clinicians will be able to offer quicker treatment and spend more time at patients’ beds.
Carl Mustad, assistant director of IT at the ABM University NHS Trust which runs both hospitals, told E-Health Insider: “Clinicians will have immediate access to clinical information at the point of care. In the Emergency Department for example, consultants will use a tablet PC to look at a patient’s pathology test results while at the patient’s bedside.”
Medication verification, electronic drug ordering and discharge summary information can be updated and the trust is hoping to track and monitor ECG machines and infusion pumps.
Fixed and wireless networking could also be rolled out in hospitals, community clinics and GP surgeries within the trust’s catchment area.
Other areas which could be linked into the wireless system include paging systems, bed availability management and protecting vulnerable patients.
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