North East-based health tech startup, FloKi Health, has developed its existing Bluetooth beacon technology to also enable the GPS tracking of equipment located outside of hospital walls.
Recognising the increased need for medical equipment during the coronavirus pandemic, FloKi has expanded on its existing technology product to track and locate loan equipment in the local community.
Hosted through Google, FloKi’s Bluetooth beacon technology with integrated GPS tracking enables the quick location of medical equipment so that NHS staff can identify what they need and find out where it is.
Medical professionals can use the system on top of their own asset management platform, specifically designed for NHS trusts to not only find equipment, but to also monitor and manage what is on hospital wards.
Fenwick Smith, chief executive at FloKi, said: “We’ve been creating and developing our Bluetooth beacon platform for three years and we’d already considered the option to locate community loan equipment before the pandemic hit.
With our GPS tracking in place, NHS staff can locate the equipment they need to save both time and money, but it could also help to save lives
“Noticing the strain that coronavirus was, and still is, having on the NHS, we pulled our plans forward to integrate this new element.
"With our GPS tracking in place, NHS staff can locate the equipment they need to save both time and money, but it could also help to save lives.”
For over three years FloKi has been working within the health industry to understand the barriers and real case needs for equipment tracking.
With the technology in place, devices such as bladder scanners and ultrasounds can be tracked using an App and can also be marked for repair and maintenance if needed.
Through research conducted by the start-up, it was discovered that one NHS trust had 374 morphine pumps split between the community loan and hospital wards, with an estimated cost of £500,000 of inventory.
Fenwick said: “When administering potentially-lethal levels of drugs, such as morphine, maintenance is of paramount importance.
“In this case, for the cost equivalent of 15 pumps (approximately 4%) we could locate, check the compliance and develop workflows for these assets, which, in turn, would reduce risk, lower the required number needed, and thus their maintenance costs.”
