Rehab Center Monitors Patients With Ultra-wide Band

In addition, PLUS 2.0 now enables interrogators to store their calibration constants, making it easier for customers to use and reboot their RTLS in the event of a power outage (see Time Domain Enhances Its UWB Location System). TDOA systems such as PLUS require calibration at the initial setup stage, necessitating that all readers and reference tags be positioned in a known grid. The system reads the tags and combines that information with tag location data manually input into the system. The readers then tune themselves for optimal performance. Most reference tags can be removed, but some must typically be left in position for re-calibration if there is a power outage or some other problem, such as a hardware failure or reader replacement.

Now, however, each interrogator within the RTLS can tell the back-end PLUS software its stored, initial calibration points. "This is the most important piece," Heppenheimer says. "Nursing facilities operate twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. If a system goes down, you can't wait for an hour or day or week for someone to bring it back up when it is supposed to be keeping patients safe all the time. You can't say, 'Oh, well, we had a power outage and the system didn't reset, so Mom got outside and got hypothermia, or worse.' [The ability to automatically re-calibrate] was absolutely a line in the sand that had to be breached."

Not only will the RTLS and TracPoint software allow Nesconset to track patient locations in real-time, but they will also provide the center with historical location data. According to Heppenheimer, this information will help the staff better understand patient movement, as well as provide data during any alleged or potential resident abuse investigations, as required by law.

"One of the goals I have for the system is that we will now have the ability to go back and see residents' behavior and movement," Heppenheimer says. This will provide the center with an historical picture of where the resident was located, and with whom that person interacted. "We'll be able to create resident behavioral profiles to better tailor staff interaction with them. If every morning at 10 a.m., a particular resident starts to wander, we'll then know that every morning at 10 a.m., we need to get that resident involved in an activity to divert the wandering."

Nesconset expects to have all patients and staff members in the dementia unit using the RTLS by year's end. In addition, the center plans to implement a less granular version throughout the facility—which, rather than determine a patient's precise location, will provide location data in various zones, such as the east end of a facility wing.