Birmingham and Solihull extends patient RFID tagging
Birmingham’s Heart of England NHS Foundation Trust has announced that it is to further expand its trial of tagging surgical patients with RFID wristbands. E-Health Insider reported in October 2004 the trials of a tagging system in the ENT department of the Heart of England trust, then called Birmingham Heartlands and Solihill NHS Trust. Patients arriving […]
News
Texting reduces treatment times for STIs
A six-month study into the effect of text messaging in an STI clinic has revealed that sending notifications by SMS significantly reduces time to treatment and staff workload. Patients who were tested for Chlamydia at the John Hunter clinic at the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital in central London were notified by SMS of their results […]
News
Asthma sufferers get help from space
Mobile phone users with asthma in south London are getting pollution alerts via SMS thanks to satellite technology from the European Space Agency (ESA). The AirTEXT project uses data from weather instruments on the ESA’s Envisat satellite. Around 45 texts per year are sent over the system, with air quality warnings sent out the […]
News
SMS appointment reminders get language boost
A GP practice in south London which is using text messaging to send out appointment reminders to its patients will soon start sending out SMSs in separate languages. The Patient Care Messaging system, supplied by iPlato and running from the practice’s EMIS database, has been used to send out flu jab prompts to patients at risk as […]
News
Training on the go
Dr Neil Bacon, founder of Doctors.net.uk, on the benefits of online training and how a programme funded by the HPA helped GPs on his site prepare for major incidents.
Feature
SMS event alert system planned for care workers
iSentry have announced the release of their Digital Witness service, a web-based compliance monitoring and alert system aimed at health and social care workers. The system has been tested by the Devon and Cornwall Autistic Community Trust (Spectrum) and is already in use there. The Digital Witness system allows workers to enter event records they […]
News
NHS temp workers to get shifts by SMS
NHS human resources managers may soon be able to text temporary staff on their books with details of their vacancies, thanks to a partnership announced between a staffing management software company and an SMS paging network. Key IT Systems, which covers around 312 healthcare organisations, is to integrate a text messaging platform provided by PageOne […]
News
Tag team care
Colin Jervis of Kinetic Consulting examines some of the innovative ways that RFID tags are being used in patient care and health administration.
Feature
Addenbrooke’s installs SMS patient reminder system
Addenbrooke’s Hospital, Cambridge, has implemented an SMS reminder system for patient appointments after a series of pilots of different software. Three solutions were tested in the hospital by staff, and the software chosen by the staff was manufactured by Advanced Messaging. The text-based reminders are currently being sent out to people attending dermatology appointments. Plans […]
News
Unreliable patients most likely to ask for SMS reminders
Patients most likely to be ‘Did Not Attends’ (DNAs) at outpatient clinics are also the most likely to sign up for text reminders, according to new research. SMS patient appointment reminders can reduce DNAs by up to 30% even if only 20% of patients sign up to receive the service, says a study published by Wireless Healthcare. […]
News