RTLS Providers Cite Strong Demand From Hospitals

Another provider of RFID-based RTLS health-care solutions is Awarepoint, which provides a ZigBee-based RTLS as a fully managed service, including hardware, software, remote monitoring and maintenance. The company's offerings include sterilizable tags for tracking assets, as well as tags that monitor temperatures ranging from -28 degrees Celsius to +90 degrees Celsius (-18 degrees Fahrenheit to +194 degrees Fahrenheit).

Matt Perkins, Awarepoint's CTO, says his company focuses on describing three ROI drivers to health-care providers considering deploying the company's system: better management of rental assets to reduce the cost of those rentals, fewer man-hours spent tracking assets owned by the health-care provider and reduced shrinkage through the issuing of alerts when assets are removed from the premises.

"RTLS is not quite the de facto standard among hospitals," Perkins says, "but I believe the market will move toward complete adoption in just a few years, as more hospitals are willing to embrace new technology."

Recently, the company announced the deployment of its real-time locating system at the Rebecca and John Moores UCSD Cancer Center. Two other UCSD hospitals have also deployed Awarepoint's RTLS (see UCSD Medical Center Expands Its RFID Deployment), which now covers 1.5 million square feet across the three hospitals, with more than 2,000 assets under management.