Method of wireless discovery and networking of medical devices in care environments

• US 10,200,241 B2
• Filed: 05/13/2016
• Issued: 02/05/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 05/13/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Stryker Corporation
• Original Assignee: Stryker Corporation
• Inventors: Shen, John T., Feingold, Benjamin H., Bennett, David B., Godhani, Rohitkumar, Gundi, Mithun, Jones, III, Robert L.
• Primary Examiner(s): Kizou, Hassan
• Assistant Examiner(s): Belur, Deepa
• Application Number:
  US15/154,406
• Publication Number:
  US 20160337182A1
• Time in Patent Office: 998 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 20/40 relating to mechanical, radiation or invasive therapies, e.g. surgery, laser therapy, dialysis or acupuncture
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 40/20 for the management or administration of healthcare resources or facilities, e.g. managing hospital staff or surgery rooms
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 40/67 for remote operation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0806 for initial configuration or provisioning, e.g. plug-and-play
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/12 specially adapted for proprietary or special-purpose networking environments, e.g. medical networks, sensor networks, networks in vehicles or remote metering networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/08 User group management
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/30 Services specially adapted for particular environments, situations or purposes
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 8/005 Discovery of network devices, e.g. terminals
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 80/00 Wireless network protocols or protocol adaptations to wireless operation
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/12 WLAN [Wireless Local Area Networks]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/20 Master-slave selection or change arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 88/16 Gateway arrangements

Abstract

A system for automatically establishing a network. The system includes a main device group including a main wireless transceiver device, a control device and a first network interface and a secondary device group including a secondary wireless transceiver device, a secondary device group slave device and a second network interface. The main wireless transceiver device wirelessly communicating with the secondary wireless transceiver device to instruct the main device group and the secondary device group to form a network wherein the control device communicates with the secondary device group slave device over the first network interface and the second network interface, respectively. The control device wirelessly controls functions of the secondary device group slave device with instructions sent over the network. The main wireless transceiver device only wirelessly communicates with the secondary wireless transceiver device when the main wireless transceiver device and the secondary wireless transceiver device are in a location.

Claims

1. A method of controlling at least one slave device comprising:

providing a control device;

outputting at least one control signal from the control device to a first wireless gateway, the at least one control signal from the control device not having a destination address;

adding a second wireless gateway address to the at least one control signal with the first wireless gateway;

wirelessly transmitting the at least one control signal from the first wireless gateway to a second wireless gateway;

removing the second wireless gateway address from the at least one control signal with the second wireless gateway; and

sending the at least one control signal to the at least one slave device.

2. The method of claim 1, further including:

outputting status signals from the at least one slave

device to the second wireless gateway;

adding a first wireless gateway address to the status signals with the second wireless gateway;

wirelessly transmitting the status signals from the second wireless gateway to the first wireless gateway;

removing the first wireless gateway address from the status signals with the first wireless gateway; and

sending the status signals to the control device.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein:

the first wireless gateway and the second wireless gateway communicate over WiFi.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein:

the at least one slave device comprises a plurality of slave devices;

the at least one control signal comprises a plurality of control signals;

and the method further includes;

adding a port address to each of the plurality of control signals, each port address corresponding to a port associated with one of the plurality of slave devices.

5. The method of claim 1, further including:

associating a token with each of the first wireless gateway

and the second wireless gateway to provide a network identification to each of the first wireless gateway and the second wireless gateway to allow the first wireless gateway and the second wireless gateway to communicate over a network associated with the network identification.

6. The method of claim 1, further including:

connecting a main wireless transceiver device to the first wireless gateway;

connecting a secondary wireless transceiver device to the second wireless gateway;

wirelessly communicating a network identification from the main wireless transceiver device to the secondary wireless transceiver device to instruct the first wireless gateway and the second wireless gateway to form a network to allow the first wireless gateway and the second wireless gateway to communicate over a network associated with the network identification.

7. The method of claim 1, further including:

connecting the second wireless gateway to the at least one slave device;

sending a first device discovery message from the second wireless gateway to the at least one slave device using a first communication protocol;

if the at least one slave device responds to the first device discovery message using the first communication protocol, establishing communication between the at least one slave device and the control device using the first communication protocol;

if the at least one slave device does not respond to the first device discovery message using the first communication protocol, sending a second device discovery message from the second wireless gateway to the at least one slave device using a second communication protocol;

if the at least one slave device responds to the second device discovery message using the second communication protocol, establishing communication between the at least one slave device and the control device using the second communication protocol.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein:

the second wireless gateway wirelessly communicates the first communication protocol or the second communication protocol to the first wireless gateway connected to the control device.

9. The method of claim 7, wherein:

if the at least one slave device does not respond to the second device discovery message using the second communication protocol, sending a third device discovery message from the second wireless gateway to the at least one slave device using a third communication protocol;

if the at least one slave device responds to the third device discovery message using the third communication protocol, establishing communication between the at least one slave device and the control device using the third communication protocol.

10. The method of claim 1, further including:

connecting the second wireless gateway to the at least one slave device;

sending a status update request from the second wireless gateway to the at least one slave device;

if the at least one slave device responds to the status update request that a status thereof has not changed, not wirelessly sending a status message to the control device;

if the at least one slave device responds to the status update request that the status thereof has changed, wirelessly sending the status message to the control device that the status of the at least one slave device has changed.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein:

the at least one control signal from the control device does not have a source address.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein:

outputting the at least one control signal from the control device to the first wireless gateway occurs over a wired connection.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein:

sending the at least one control signal to the at least one slave device includes sending the at least one control signal from the second gateway to the at least one slave device over a wired connection.

14. The method of claim 1, wherein:

outputting the at least one control signal from the control device to the first wireless gateway occurs over a first wired connection; and

sending the at least one control signal to the at least one slave device includes sending the at least one control signal from the second gateway to the at least one slave device over a second wired connection.